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HELEN  VILMANS, 


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A 


Blossom    of   the  Century. 


BY  HELEN  WILMANS. 


#^ 


^ 


IV 


"Out  of  the  night  that  shelters  me, 
Black  as  the  pit  from  pole  to  pole, 
I  thank  whatever  gods  there  be 
For  my  unconquerable  soul." 


SEA  BREEZE,  FLORIDA : 
FREEDOM  PUBLISHING  COMPANY. 


COPYRIGHTED,  1893, 

BY 

HELEN  WILMANS. 


>• 

oc 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 


CHAPTER  I. 


THE  INTUITIVE  PERCEPTION  OF  A  TRUTH  THAT 

HAS  NOT  AS  YET  BEEN  MADE  APPARENT  TO 

THE  REASONING  FACULTIES. 


g  In  looking  back  I  now  see   that  a  belief  in 

death  as  a  fixed  and  unalterable  fact  never  had 

full  possession  of  me, 

d  I  doubt  whether,  in  the  true  sense,  it  really  has 

^       full  possession  of  any  one ; for, while  it  seems  real 

§       enough,  so  far  as  the  dying  of  other   people   is 

z      concerned,  we  rarely  think  of  it  as  being  an  in- 

3      evitable  reality  for  ourselves.     It  always  seems 

a  far  off  and  shadowy  possibility,   but  not    an 

irresistible  fate  such  as   a  man  feels   it  to   be 

who  is  under  sentence  of  death  for  some  crime. 


448075 


4  THE  BLOSSOM  OP  THE  CENTURY. 

And  yet  reason,  so  far  as  our  reason  is  based 
on  observation,  tells  us  that  death  is  as  certain 
to  come  to  us  as  to  the  condemned  felon  in  his 
cell.     And  why  are  we  so  little  disturbed  by  it? 

Is  it  because  we  anticipate  life  beyond  the 
grave?  The  felon  also  anticipates  this;  and, 
moreover,  his  expectations  for  happiness  in  an- 
other world  are  usuatly  as  bright  to  his  imagin- 
ation as  ours  can  be.  Then  why  does  he  dread 
death  while  we  do  not? 

It  is  because  he  realizes  that  to  him  it  is  in- 
evitable, while  we  realize  nothing  of  the  kind. 

To  be  sure  our  reason,  based  on  observation, 
admits  that  it  is  inevitable ;  but  there  is  in  us 
some  hidden  impulse  that  denies  the  inevit- 
ableness  of  it.  And  this  hidden  impulse  be- 
trays the  presence,  deep  down  at  the  very  foun- 
tain head  of  individual  existence,  of  some  un- 
seen spring  of  ever  present  vitality,  the  dis- 
covery of  which  will  overcome  death.  We  feel  it, 
though  we  do  not  see  it ;  and  there  is  an  unde- 
fined something  in  man  that  lives  more  by 
feeling  than  seeing,  and  so  death  is  inwardly 
rejected  while  verbally  accepted. 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.  6 

If  man  accepted  death  all  over,  in  his  inner 
as  well  as  his  outer  consciousness,  he  would 
feel  about  it  very  much  as  this  condemned  fel- 
on does.  It  would  occupy  his  every  thought 
and  render  him  unfit  for  any  effort  in  life  ex 
cept  a  preparation  for  death.  In  short  the 
certain  knowledge  of  coming  death  would  be 
equivalent  to  present  death  so  far  as  the  uses 
of  life  are  concerned. 

But  men  are  not  expecting  to  die ;  their  lives 
prove  it ;  they  are  deeply  interested  in  a  thous- 
and schemes  of  activity,  and  they  are  happy  in 
their  efforts  to  better  their  conditions  and  to 
surround  themselves  with  pleasing  things. 
"Death  is  inevitable,"  they  say,  but  their  words 
do  not  touch  them  ;  they  do  not  excite  them  in 
the  least.  It  is  only  when  they  feel  its  icy 
touch  that  they  begin  to  have  even  the  slight- 
est realization  of  it  as  applicable  to  their  own 
cases. 

As  soon  as  men  begin  to  feel  that  death  is 
impending,  their  fear  is  then  aroused  and  they 
%eek  to  escape  from  it. 

That  they  do  fear  it  and  seek  to  escape  from 


6  THE  BLOSSOM  OF   THE  CENTURY. 

it,  is  proof  conclusive  that  there  is  a  way  of  es- 
cape from  it ;  for  there  is  no  truth  in  the  cos- 
mic growth  of  the  race  more  true  than  that 
every  hope  is  the  sure  prophecy  of  its  own  ful- 
fillment The  dread  of  death  is  the  hope  of 
life,  Hope — which  is  an  expression  of  the  Law 
of  Life  in  man — cannot  possibly  point  to  that 
which  does  not  exist.  It  always  streams  forth 
in  the  direction  of  that  which  is  correlated  to 
it ;  of  that  which  is  its  complement,  and  the 
acquisition  of  which  fixes  it  in  living  substance  as 
a  new  creation. 

The  idea  that  projects  life  beyond  the  grave 
does  not  altogether  allay  the  fear  of  death ;  nor 
does  the  promise  of  heaven,  with  all  its  attrac- 
tions, reconcile  it  to  us.  So  long  as  even  a 
modicum  of  the  old  vitality  lasts,  we  prefer 
this  troublesome  and  poverty-stricken  world  to 
the  "  spheres  of  the  blest."  It  is  only  when 
the  vitality  is  too  low  for  resistance  that  men, 
as  a  rule,  become   reconciled  to  go. 

To  be  sure,  there  are  abnormal  instances 
where  men's  imaginations  have  been  so  stimu- 
lated by  descriptions  of   the  next  world,   they 


THE  BLOSSOM   OF  THE  CENTURY.  7 

have  let.  go  the  frail  hold  they  had  upon  this  one, 
and  have  seemed  anxious  to  go.  But  we  all  ad- 
mit that  men  in  such  conditions  are  unbalanced. 

We  do  not  want  to  die ;  this  is  the  plain  fact. 
We  do  not  want  to  die,  no  matter  how  hard  life 
seems,  or  how  enchanting  the  future  is  painted 
for  us.  We  not  only  do  not  want  to  die,  but 
we  do  not  expect  it.  It  always  comes  upon  us 
as  a  surprise. 

The  race  believes  that  it  believes  that  an  im- 
placable and  inexorable  God  has  passed  sen- 
tence of  death  upon  it;  it  also  claims  to  justify 
God  in  having  done  so ;  but  its  position  is  self- 
deceptive,  and  its  actions  contradict  its  as- 
sumed belief  in  God's  power  and  wisdom. 
It  is  constantly  seeking  remedies  by  which  it 
can  thwart  God's  purpose  in  killing  it;  and 
down  deep  in  the  soul  of  it,  it  vests  more  hope 
in  the  power  of  a  pill  than  in  the  power  of  God. 

It  has  its  body  tinkers  and  its  soul  tinkers ; 
and  it  clings  to  its  body  tinker  until  hope  de- 
serts it;  and  then  in  despair  it  turns  to  its  soul 
tinker. 

And  when  a  loved  one  has  passed  through  the 


8  THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

veil  out  of  sight,  though  we  say,  "  He  is  happy 
now,  he  is  in  the  bosom  of  God,  and  sorrow, 
sickness  and  death  shall  touch  him  no  more," 
we  weep  and  refuse  to  be  comforted.  And  I 
say  that  it  is  not  the  mere  pain  of  separation 
that  wrings  our  souls,  for  he  might  have  gone  to 
another  country  or  even  to  another  planet,  and 
if  he  had  gone  alive  we  would  not  have  felt  as 
we  do. 

And  this  feeling  we  have  for  him ;  what  is  it ; 
and  why  is  it  what  it  is? 

Again  I  say,  as  I  intimated  before,  it  is  the 
intuitive  perception  of  a  truth  that  has  not  yet 
been  made  apparent  to  the  reasoning  faculties. 
It  is  because  death  is  a  violation  of  some  nat- 
ural principle  with  which  we  are  not  yet  famil- 
iar. And  because  it  is  a  violation  of  some  nat- 
ural principle,  even  though  the  principle  is 
hidden  at  -present  from  our  dwarfed  percep- 
tions, we  are  rent  asunder  by  it,  and  cannot 
reconcile  it  with  our  long  accepted  belief  that 
death  is  a  blessing  in  disguise.  It  is  human 
nature  overturning  human  religion. 

It  seems  to  me,  judging  by  myself,  that   if   a 


THE  BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  9 

man  actually  knew  that  death  was  to  be  his 
doom,  from  which  there  was  no  possibility  of 
escape,  that  he  would  so  dread  the  event  as  to 
make  life  one  prolonged  horror,  and  would  be 
prompted  to  hasten  the  thing  in  order  to  relieve 
himself  from  it;  just  as  men  condemned  to 
hang  will  hang  themselves  in  their  cells  in  order 
to  get  the  fearful  catastrophe  off  their  minds. 

The  fact  is,  men  do  not  anticipate  death  for 
themselves  whatever  they  may  do  for  others. 
Undefined  in  their  own  minds  there  remains 
fixed  forever  that  intuitive  perception  of  im- 
mortality which  belongs  to  the  unchanging  and 
undying  Life  Principle,  of  which  they  are  the 
expression,  or  visible  manifestation. 

Undefined  by  themselves,  I  say.  So  unde- 
fined is  it,  BO  misunderstood  by  them,  and  yet 
so  potent,  that  out  of  it,  out  of  this  simple  in- 
tuitive perception,  this  vague  feeling  of  immor- 
tality, has  arisen  every  theological  scheme  ever 
yet  projected  for  the  perpetuation  of  individual 
life  in  another  state  of  existence. 

Thinkers  and  reasoners  on  this  subject  ac- 
tually believe  they  have  accepted  as   inevitable 


10      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

the  death  of  the  body ;  and  so,  as  a  last  resort 
they  hold  fast  with  unswerving  tenacity  to  the 
feeling  of  immortality  which  they  find  implant- 
ed within  all  men  ;  and  they  have  therefore  en- 
dowed each  individual  of  the  race  with  a  spirit 
that  lives  beyond  the  death  of  the  body ;  and 
this  spirit  they  have  provided  out  of  their  am- 
ple imaginations  with  many  and  various  modes 
of  escape  from  annihilation. 

Religion  offers  another  world  to  the  race  as  a 
substitute  for  its  unconquerable  desire  to  live. 
It  is  the  best  thing  that  couid  be  done  in  the 
world's  past  and  perhaps  even  in  its  present 
state  of   intelligence. 

But  the  entire  reasoning  of  religion,  based  as 
it  is  upon  the  inborn  sense  of  man's  immortal- 
ity as  an  individual,  belongs  to  the  awakening 
intelligence  of  an  infant  race  not  yet  grown  to 
a  knowledge  of  its  own  power  to  conquer  death 
here  and  now,  and  to  project  a  life  of  unbroken 
progression  for  itself. 

Religion  is  but  the  pointing  finger  of  infalli- 
ble intuition  indicating  the  fact  that  there  is  a 
road  through  the  untrodden  wilderness  of   fast 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTUBY.  11 

coming  thought  which  experience  must  traverse, 
but  which  has  never  yet  been  traversed,  and 
which  when  once  traversed,  will  put  an  en- 
tirely new  face  upon  our  implanted  belief  in  our 
individual  immortality. 

Man  may  possess  a  spirit  that  lives  beyond 
his  body,  and  I  hope  and  believe  that  he  does. 
But  we  have  no  absolute  and  indisputable  proof 
of  it. 


12       THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

CHAPTER  II. 


THE    ENDLESS      CREATIVENESS    OF    THE    HUMAN 
INTELLIGENCE. 


I  am  familiar  with  the  phenomena  of  spirit- 
ualism, and  I  will  say  that  it — of  all  the  theories 
extant — furnishes  by  far  the  beat  basis  of  be- 
lief in  life  beyond  the  grave.  Spiritualism  is 
not  humbuggery.  It  is  a  genuine  thing.  Spirits, 
or  what  seem  to  be  spirits,  do  make  themselves 
visible  to  spectators  under  certain  conditions. 
The  only  doubt  concerning  the  matter,  is  not  in 
the  genuineness  of  these  apparitions,  but  in  the 
character  of  them.  Many  a  time  when  entire  ly 
alone,  they  have  appeared  to  me ;  and  at  first  I 
thought  them  veritable  messengers  from  the 
other  side. 

Later,  I  did  not  know  whether  they  were  gen- 
uine spirits  of  the  departed,  or  thought  images 
projected  by  my  own  mind.  Not  that  they 
were  unreal ;  for  they  were  real ;   they  were  not 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  13 

pictures ;  they  were  tangible  shapes  and  lasted 
for  several  minutes  at  a  time ;  but  were  they 
spirits  ? 

At  this  time  the  human  mind  begins  to  reveal 
itself  to  me  as  a  mighty,  but  an  unknown  thing ; 
as  the  seed  germ  of  a  power  whose  possibilities 
no  one  has  ever  tested  or  ever  will  entirely  test, 
because  its  unfoldment  must  go  on  forever. 

That  the  human  mind  is  the  great  creative 
power  I  do  most  sincerely  believe.  And  that  its 
power  to  create  is  absolutely  limitless  I  also 
believe. 

By  "  creative  power,"  I  simply  mean  the  pow- 
er of  making  manifest  the  wonders  that  exist  in 
latency  in  the  Law  of  Being,  or  the  Principle  of 
Life,  or  the  Law  of  Attraction ;  these  wonders 
depend  for  their  manifestation  upon  individual 
recognition. 

The  three  terms.  Law  of  Being,  Principle  of 
Life  and  Law  of  Attraction,  are  three  modes  of 
expressing  the  same  thing.  There  are  times 
when  one  of  these  modes  of  expression  seems 
best  adapted  to  convey  my  meaning,  and  times 
when  the  other  modes  seem  best.     But  for  this 


14       THE  BLOSSOM  OK  THE  CENTURY. 

I  would  simplify  the  matter  by  using  one  of 
these  expressions  only.  As  I  feel  about  it,  I 
shall  retain  them  all. 

Individual  recognition  of  a  power  heretofore 
existing  in  latency  may  be  called  a  creation. 
The  power  to  recognize  is  the  power  to  create, 
if  by  the  word  creation  we  simply  mean  the 
making  manifest  that  which  has  always  existed, 
but  has  not  existed  for  us,  because  our  intelli- 
gence had  not  ripened  to  the  point  where  we 
could  see  it. 

By  recognition  then,  the  subjective  power 
embodied  in  the  Life  Principle  becomes  an  ob- 
jective good,  or  use,  or  knowledge ;  it  becomes 
manifest  or  made  visible. 

All  things  are  already  created ;  or  all  truths 
are  already  created.  The  universe  is  a  whole, 
and  it  is  perfect.  Nothing  remains  to  be  added 
to  it.     It  is  the  absolute  and  infinite  truth. 

Man,  in  his  individual  capacity  is  the  recog- 
nizer of  this  truth.  He  correlates  the  truth — 
the  Law — to  the  extent  of  his  capacity  to  rec- 
ognize it.  By  his  recognition  of  it,  he  shows  it 
forth  in  his  personality ;    that   is,   as   much  of 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY,  15 

the  power  of  the  truth  or  the  Law  as  he  can  un- 
derstand he  makes  manifest  in  his  person. 
And  it  is  in  the  sense  of  his  power  to  recognize 
that  he  is  said  to  create. 

Thus,  in  the  absolute  sense,  there  is  no  new 
creation ;  in  a  finite  sense  the  race  is  constantly- 
creating,  and  will  never  cease  to  create.  Its 
privilege  is  to  forever  make  visible  in  the  ob- 
jective world  the  powers  that  exist  in  t^e  Infi- 
nite of  Being,  or  the  Principle  of  Life. 

The  human  mind  is  constantly  revealing  new 
good,  or  new  uses,  or  new  knowledges  out  of  the 
Law  of  Being  simply  by  recognizing  them  as 
possibilities    to    be  attained. 

Thus,  a  faint  conception  of  some  power  be- 
yond that  which  has  ever  yet  been  manifested 
by  any  member  of  the  race,  flits  through  a  man's 
mind  only  to  be  discarded  as  absurd  and  im- 
practical. But  it  comes  again  and  stronger; 
and  yet  again  and  more  powerfully  still,  until 
he  begins  to  give  it  credence.  At  this  point  his 
mind  goes  on  exploring  trips  into  unprospected 
realms  of  thought  and  brings  home  much  evi- 
dence to  sustain  him  in  his  growing  belief ;  un- 


16  THK    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

til  at  last  he  knows  that  a  thing  heretofore  con- 
sidered impossible  is  possible ;  and  he  goes  to 
work  and  demonstrates  it  to  others.  We  call 
his  work  a  creation ;  and  in  a  limited  sense  it  is 
a  creation. 

The  creative  power  is  the  power  to  recognize 
the  good ;  it  is  a  power  vested  in  intelligence ; 
and  it  is  by  this  power  alone  that  nature,  with 
man  at  its  head,  exists ;  it  is  by  this  power  that 
nature,  with  man  at  its  head,  is  on  the  road  of 
endless  progression  through  an  infinite  realm  of 
ever-widening  possibilities. 

Life  is  dual  simply  from  the  fact  that  it  is 
both  seen  and  unseen.  On  its  uftseen  side  there 
is  the  Law  of  Being,  otherwise  called  the  Law 
of  Attraction  or  the  Principle  of  Life.  On  the 
seen  side  there  is  intelligence,  which  is  the  re- 
cognition of  the  Law  of  Being. 

All  nature,  every  living  form,  every  thing  that 
is  visible  or  external  is  intelligence;  it  is  that 
which  recognizes  the  Law  of  Being;  and  that 
which  recognizes  is  mind  or  intelligence.  There- 
fore the  whole  objective  universe  is  mind ;  liv- 
ing, thinking  mind,  and  not  dead   matter.     All 


THE    BI.08S0M  OF   THE    CENTURY.  17 

the  substances  we  see  or  feel  or  that  in  any- 
way appeal  to  our  senses  are  mind  and  not  mat- 
ter. Mind  or  intelligence  ranges  the  entire  vis- 
ible universe ;  it  is  real  substance ;  we  handle 
it;  we  weigh  and  measure  it;  we  cut  it  into 
lengths  for  building  material ;  we  melt  it  and 
run  it  into  bars  for  our  Rail  Road  cars  to  run 
on;  our  cars  and  everything  we  manufacture 
are  made  out  of  various  conditions  of  the  one 
substance  of  mind. 

Mind,  in  its  myriad  forms,  ranges  every  degree 
from  solid  iron  and  granite  to  the  rarest     ether 

The  diamond  is  one  condition  of  mind ;  the 
perfume  of  a  rose  is  another  condition  of  the 
same  substance ;  and  thought  is  still  another 
condition  of  it,  and  the  most  subtile  and  power- 
ful condition  we  know  of. 

The  most  difficult  task  the  metaphysician  has 
to  perform  is  that  of  rendering  apparent  to  the 
conception  of  the  student  the  fact  that  mind  or 
intelligence  is  an  actual  substance  that  can  be 
seen  and  handled. 

We  have  always  believed  mind  to  be  an  un- 
substantial thing ;  a  principle  that  invaded  the 


18       THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

dead  substance  of  matter  and  imparted  a  tem- 
porary show  of  life  to  it ;  but  we  have  never  con- 
ceived the  fact  that  it  is  matter  itself. 

We  have  never  conceived  the  fact  that  matter 
is  mind ;  that  matter  is  the  visible  side  of  the 
Law  of  Being ;  or,  in  other  words,  that  it  is  the 
Law's  recognition  of  itself,  just  as  light  is  heat's 
recognition  of  itself. 

But  this  is  so,  and  must  be  so,  because  no  log- 
ical philosophy  can  admit  the  idea  of  deadness 
in  the  universe.  The  universe  is  a  universe,  and 
not  a  diverse.  It  is  all  life,  pure  life ;  there  is 
not  a  dead  atom  in  it.  If  there  were  even  one 
atom  of  death  in  it,  or  the  possibility  that  there 
ever  would  be  one,  then  the  universe  would  not 
be  a  whole,  and  it  could  not  endure. 

But  it  is  a  whole  ;  it  is  the  unchanging  prin- 
ciple of  life ;  it  is — on  its  unseen  or  spiritual 
side — the  Law  of  Being,  or  the  Law  of  Attrac- 
tion ;  the  law  or  principle  whose  one  function 
is  to  draw  or  to  unite.  It  is  Love  in  its  unal- 
loyed essence;  and  the  recognition  of  it  is  Intel- 
ligence or  mind,  expressed  in  a  million  varying 
beliefs,  ranging  the  entire  visible  creation. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  19 

The  tree  is  a  belief.  It  is  the  exterualization 
of  the  Law  of  Being,  or  the  Law  of  Attraction 
to  the  extent  of  the  tree's  intelligence.  The 
tree  shows  forth  as  much  of  the  good  or  the  life 
embodied  in  the  Law  of  Being  as  it  can  recog- 
nize. 

Recognition  takes  form  in  beliefs ;  and  be- 
liefs are  substance ;  the  substance  to  which  we 
falsely    ascribe  the  name  of  "dead  matter." 

Every  belief  takes  on  form.  No  matter  how 
short  lived  the  belief  may  be,  nor  how  frail ;  if 
it  is  a  belief  at  all,  it  is,  for  the  time  being,  some 
phase  of  recognition  of  the  possibilities  of  the 
Law  of  Being ;  and  every  form  of  recognition 
is  mind  or  intelligence,  and  therefore  substance, 
and  shows  forth  as  a  substantial  entity.  It  is 
some  fraction  of  the  Law  in  objectivity. 

A  belief  differs  from  a  thought  only  in  the 
matter  of  fixedness;  a  thought  is  a  transient 
thing  unless  it  becomes  fixed  in  a  belief,  and 
then  it  is  more  permanent  and  therefore  more 
apparent :  it  is  a  fraction  of  the  Law  of  Being 
in  more  decided  objectivity  than  a  mere  pass- 
ing thought. 


20  THE    BLOSSOM    OF   '^HE    CENTURY. 

Our  thoughts,  then,  are  real  things;  ana 
though  usually  invisible,  being  in  a  great  meas- 
ure under  the  control  of  our  bodies — which 
are  the  sum  total  of  our  fixed  beliefs,  they  are 
too  frail  and  fleeting  to  assume  the  substantial 
appearance  of  bodies.  Nevertheless  they  are  real 
substance  and  have  form :  they  are  originated  in 
our  bodies  ;  and  though  invisible  as  a  rule,  they 
do  become  objective  to  our  bodies,  and  go  forth 
as  living  but  probably  as  short  lived  entities. 

The  thoughts  are  real,  because  they  are  in- 
tellectual conceptions  of  something ;  and  there 
can  be  no  intellectual  conception  that  is  not, 
in  its  degree,  a  recognition  of  that  which  is ;  a 
recognition  of  some  phase  of  the  Law  of  Being. 
There  can  be  no  recognition  of  that  which  is 
not ;  and  therefore  even  the  frailest  and  most 
fleeting  thought  has  form,  whether  we  see  it  or 
not. 

But  there  are  certain  conditions  of  a  man's 
mind,  usually  conditions  of  negation,  conditions 
of  abstraction,  during  which  he  is  not  noticing 
what  is  transpiring  in  his  mind,  when  it  is  pos- 
sible for   his  thoughts   to  express    themselves 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  21 

without  the  help  or  even  the  cognizance  of  the 
man  by  whom  or  from  whom  they  are  express- 
ed. In  this  way  they  may  abstract  enough  of 
the  man's  mentality  or  body  to  make  them- 
selves visible  not  only  to  the  man  himself,  but 
to  others  who  may  be  present. 

The  first  time  I  saw  "a  spirit"  was  when  a 
student  at  a  Catholic  school.  It  was  a  bright 
moonlight  night,  and  about  twenty  of  us  had 
taken  a  run  from  the  hall  door  down  through 
the  crisp  snow  to  an  old  tree  that  grew  near 
the  house.  I  stood  for  a  few  minutes  quite 
apart  from  my  companions,  and  found  myself 
looking  up  into  the  tree  in  that  condition  of 
thought  which  is  almost  entirely  unconscious 
of  itself.  I  was  looking  at  a  woman  who  was 
standing  far  out  on  one  of  the  limbs  of  the  tree, 
and  who  was  balanced  lightly  on  one  foot  with 
her  other  foot  swinging,  and  her  arms  raised  as 
she  held  a  pale  blue  scarf  that  the  wind  filled 
and  swung  to  and  fro.  I  stood  looking  at  this 
marvelous  sight  without  one  particle  of  fear  or 
wonder  or  any  other  feeling  that  I  can  recall. 
The  woman's  dress  was   like   that   of   a   ballet 


22      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

girl,  and  the  limb  on  which  her  foot  rested  was 
not  larger  than  a  riding  whip. 

But  as  I  continued  to  look,  without  any  special 
interest  in  the  sight,  I  was  conscious  of  the  bab- 
ble of  voices  kept  up  by  the  other  girls,  though 
unconscious  of  what  they  were  saying ;  until  one 
of  them  cried  out,  "Oh !  look  up  in  the  tree."  A 
deep  silence  then  ensued,  and  was  broken  by  the 
simultaneous  rush  which  they  made  towards  the 
house.  In  another  instant  I  became  conscious 
of  the  situation,  and  turning  I  ran  after  them, 
becoming  more  frightened  with  each  step. 

Was  this  a  spirit,  or  was  it  a  projection  from 
myself? 

Since  then  I  have  had  hundreds  of  exper- 
iences similar  to  this,  and  they  are  all  marked 
by  the  same  absence  of  a  certain  part  of  my- 
self that  prevents  the  feeling  in  me  of  fear  or 
wonder  or  any  emotion  whatever.  The  remem- 
brance of  things  of  this  kind  has  often  frighten- 
ed me  after  they  have  passed,  and  I  have  many 
times  felt  a  great  dread  of  their  recurrence ;  but 
never  once  have  I  been  frightened  or  even  as- 
tonished at  the  time. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTUEY.  23 

In  the  same  frame  of  mind — a  condition  in 
which  I — the  person  of  the  house,  seem  to  be 
almost  out  of  my  house,  I  have  heard  voices 
that  spoke  to  me ;  but  they  never  told  me  any- 
thing bnyond  what  I  could  have  conceived  \V^ith- 
out  them. 

But  perhaps  the  most  singular  of  these  ex- 
periences has  been  the  manifestation  of  a  pow- 
er that  lifts  m.e  up  and  makes  me  feel  that  I 
do  not  weigh  an  ounce.  I  have  lain  in  bed  in 
a  room  where  the  lamp  burned  brightly,  and 
have  been  lifted — bed  and  all — until  I  could 
touch  the  ceiling  with  my  hand.  I  have  sat  on 
a  stout  table  and  have  been  lifted  with  the 
table  until  my  head  touched  the  top  of  the 
room. 

One  would  suppose  that  such  marked  and 
various  manifestations  as  these  would  at  once 
convince  me  that  there  was  no  way  by  which 
they  could  be  accounted  for  except  by  spirit 
agency. 

But  I  am  not  convinced  of  this,  though  I 
would  have  been  glad  to  accept  such  a  convic- 
tion if  I  could  have  rested  in   content   upon  it. 


24      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

The  very  wonders  of  the  human  mind,  as  they 
begin  to  disclose  themselves  to  me  during  the 
years  I  have  been  devoting  myself  exclusively 
to  its  study,  have  made  it  impossible  for  me  to 
rest  such  phenomena  upon  the  generally  ac- 
cepted conclusions  of  spiritualism. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  25 

CHAPTER   III. 


ALL  GROWTH  IS  A  RKVOLT    AGAINST  THE  CLAIMS 
OF  THE  SO-CALLED  LAW  OF  GRAVITATION. 


No  man  has  tested  the  powers  of  his  own 
mind ;  no  man  knows  its  mysterious  compli- 
cations, or  dreams  of  the  strange  seed  lying 
dormant  within  it,  and  capable  of  springing  up 
into  the  blossoming  and  fruitage  of  such  won- 
ders as  it  would  be  madness  even  to  name  in 
these  pages. 

But  in  these  years  of  study  that  I  speak  of, 
enough  has  been  revealed  to  me  of  the  giant 
power  sleeping  in  the  brain  of  the  race  to  keep 
me  from  wandering  off  to  other  worlds  for  a 
solution  of  its  exceptional  actions.  Many 
things  concerning  it  that  will  seem  fabulous  to 
others,  I  know  to  be  true ;  and  indeed  so  great 
have  become  my  conceptions  of  its  possibilities 
that  at  this  time  I  have  pulled  up  all  the  stakes 
that  have  ever,  to  me,   environed   it,  and  have 


26  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

established  it  in  my  belief  as  respondent  in 
all  particulars  to  that  omnipotent,  omniscient 
and  omnipresent  Principle  of  Life  that  men 
call  God. 

I  think  it  will  readidly  be  seen  how — there 
being  no  nothing,  and  thoughts  being  things — 
that  a  thought  may  appear  in  objectivity  from 
the  thinker,  and  thereby  become  apparent  to 
the  thinker  and  to  others  who  may  be  present. 

The  same  thing  may  be  said  of  the  voices  we 
hear. 

But  these  explanations  go  for  nothing  so 
long  as  it  remains  that  some  seemingly  invis- 
ible power  can  overcome  the  law  of  gravitation 
in  the  human  form,  and  lift  it  from  the  earth 
with   evident  ease. 

This  matter  remained  a  mystery  to  me  for 
years,  until  I  learned  that  man  had  the  power 
to  become  master  of  the  law  of  gravitation, 
after  which  he  could  float  in  the  air  at  his  ease. 

"But,"  some  one  remonstrates,  *'  you  had  no 
knowledge  of  this  power,  and  yet  you  floated ; 
therefore  it  must  be  that  some  power  outside  of 
yourself  lifted  you." 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  27 

For  a  long  time  I  reasoned  this  way  myself ; 
and  I  believed  that  I  was  lifted  by  spirit 
power. 

But  after  a  time  I  considered  how  it  had  ever 
been,  that  some  seemingly  accidental  exhibition 
of  a  new  power  had  come  as  a  forerunner  to 
open  the  eyes  of  men  to  a  new  possibility  within 
themselves ;  and  I  began  to  see  that  this  exper- 
ience of  mine  might  belong  to  this  same  class 
of  premature  revelations. 

I  could  readily  admit  that  if  it  were  in  a 
man's  power  to  overcome  the  law  of  gravity, 
(so-called)  that  accidental  conditions  of 
thought  might  arise  within  him,  unanalyzed  by 
himself,  that  for  the  time  being,  until  changed 
by  his  quickening  belief,  would  lift  him  into 
the  air. 

The  more  I  thought  about  it,  the  more  I  be- 
came convinced  of  it.  The  more  I  reasoned  on 
the  law  of  gravitation,  the  law  which  seems  to 
draw  all  things  to  the  centre  of  the  earth,  the 
more  clearly  I  saw  that  it  was  the  Law  of  At- 
traction in  its  action  upon — so-called — dead 
matter ;  and  that  there  was  no  power  that  could 


28  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

of  itself  draw  anything  towards  the  earth's  cen- 
tre provided  the  thing  to  be  drawn  did  not  want 
to  be  drawn  in  that  direction. 

That  any  substance  or  thing,  no  matter  how 
powerful,  could  refuse  to  obey  this  law,  proved 
at  once  that  there  was  a  higher  power  than  the 
law,  or  else  that  the  law  was  not  under- 
stood. 

Of  course  I  at  once  assumed  that  the  law  was 
not  understood. 

The  law  of  gravitation  is  that  power  which 
draws  towards  the  centre  of  the  earth ;  but  what 
is  the  Law  of  Attraction? 

I  answer  that  there  is  but  one  law  and  I  shall 
call  it  the  Law  of  Attraction,  The — so-called — 
law  of  gravitation  is  the  negative  action  of  the 
Law  of  Attraction.  In  other  words  it  is  the 
Law  of  Attraction  in  its  action  upon  what  is 
called  dead  matter ;  it  is  powerless  upon  all  sub- 
stances in  proportion  to  the  intelligence  of  the 
substance.  It  cannot  compel  the  intelligent 
will  of  any  creature  to  obey  it .  Indeed  I  may 
state  it  in  this  way ,;  that  while  the  law  of 
gravitation,   the   law   that  draws  to  the  earth's 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.      29 

centre,  is  operative  upon  mind  in  its  una- 
wakened  condition,  yet  it  is  powerless  to  act 
on  mind  in  which  a  will  has  been  developed. 
As  weak  a  thing  as  a  blade  of  grass  obeys  its 
own  will ;  a  will  that  leads  it  upward  instead 
of  downwards  towards  the  earth's  centre.  I 
saw  it  rise  out  of  the  earth  and  begin  its  little 
journey  towards  the  sun.  I  saw  as  feeble  a 
thing  as  a  crawling  worm  overcome  the  earth's 
attraction,  and  mount  a  tree  trunk  climbing  up- 
wards in  obedience  to  its  own  awakening  per- 
ceptions of  the  Law  of  Attraction,  expressed  in 
itself   as  will  power. 

I  saw  that  while  "dead  matter,"  which  is 
mind  unconscious  of  its  own  will,  was  held  to 
the  earth's  centre,  that  "live  matter,"  which  is 
mind  conscious  of  its  own  will,  was  on  a  jour- 
ney in  another  direction. 

Then  there  is  no  law  that  holds  objects  to 
the  earth's  centre  provided  the  objects  have  a 
will  to  travel  towards  the  sun.  This  so-called 
law  is  the  law  of  inertia ;  the  law  of  death  to 
the  dead ;  or  in  strict  truth  it  is  the  absence,  as 
nearly  as  can  be.   of   the   Law   of  Attraction, 


30      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

which  is  the  only  Law  of  Life ;  the  Law  of 
growth. 

The  law  of  gravitation  is  the  negative  pole  of 
the  Law  of  Attraction  or  the  Law  of  Being. 

The  peach  ripens  and  falls ;  it  falls  toward 
the  earth.     Why? 

Because  it  is  so  much  inert  substance,  and  it 
is  drawn  to  a  larger  body  of  inert  substance. 
If  the  peach  had  been  larger  and  heavier  than 
the  earth  it  would  have  drawn  the  earth  to   it 

In  bodies  of  equal  deadness,  by  which  I  mean 
bodies  that  are  equally  lacking  in  conscious- 
ness of  will,  the  power  to  draw  each  other  is 
dependent  on  their  size  and  weight.  But  once 
introduce  into  inert  mind  (matter)  the  vital- 
izing principle  of  conscious  will,  and  the  whole 
statement  is  changed.  Size  and  weight  have 
nothing  to  do  with  the  drawing  power,  the  con- 
scious will  is  under  obedience  only  to  its  own 
desire  The  latent  power  slumbering  in  mat- 
ter has  awakened,  and  it  has  come  under  obe- 
dience to  the  Law  of  Attraction. 

It  has  evolved  a  will  that  its  intelligence  re- 
cognizes as  its  leading  power,  and  it  goes  to  any 


THE  BLOSSOM  CP  THE  CENTURY.      31 

place  towards  which  the  will  may  point,  wheth- 
er towards  the  earth  or  away  from  it.  If  it 
goes  away  from  the  earth  as  all  advanced  life 
does  in  its  growth,  it  goes  as  far  away  as  its 
intelligence  permits  it  to  go.  That  is,  it  goes 
as  far  as  it  believes  that  it  can  go ;  its  belief  in 
this  particular  marking  the  limit  of  its  intel- 
ligence. Flying  creatures  are  more  unlimited 
in  their  belief  in  this  one  matter  than  the  crea- 
tures that  remain  on  the  earth.  And  it  is  be- 
cause they  do  realize  more  of  the  Law  of  At- 
traction than  other  creatures  that  they  have 
sprouted  wings.  The  law  of  cosmogony  express- 
es itself  in  conformity  with  a  belief  in  the  Law 
of  Attraction ;  and  evolution  has  steadidly  pro- 
ceeded on  this  principle  from  the  first  effort  of 
individualism  to  man. 

The  Law  of  Attraction  is  the  law  of  gravi- 
tation raised  from  a  basis  of  unconscious  life 
or  ignorance  of  life,  to  a  conception  of  life  in 
which  the  will  becomes  the  principal  factor 
and  elects  for  itself  the  direction  in  which  it 
shall    be    attracted.     Intelligence  refuses    obe- 


32      THE  BLOSSOM  OP  THE  CENTURY. 

dience  to  mere  bulk  and  weight,  and  follows 
any  attraction   that  seems  good  to  it, 

A  grain  of  sand  is  under  obedience  to  the 
law  of  gravitation;  the  earth  holds  it  to  herself. 
But  imagine  the  grain  of  sand  changed  to  a 
minute  insect ;  it  instantly  declares  its  free- 
dom from  the  law  that  influences  dead  matter 
only,  and  lifts  itself  up  above  the  earth.  And 
it  will  retain  its  independence  of  the  earth  un- 
til it  dies ;  then  the  earth  by  the  law  of  dead- 
ness  in  which  bulk  and  weight  make  the  attrac- 
tion, claims  its  own,  and  the  insect  lies  help- 
less upon  it. 

The  whole  tendency  of  evolution  is  from  in- 
ertia to  activity ;  from  deadness  to  life ;  from 
obedience  to  the  Law  of  inert  or  unawakened 
substance,  to  the  intelligent  attraction  which 
is  the  law  of  living  or  conscious  substance. 

In  strict  truth  there  is  no  dead  substance, 
because  all  substance  holds  life  in  latency; 
but  until  the  latent  life  principle  begins  to  ex- 
press itself  intelligently,  this  substance  is  un- 
der obedience  to  the  law  of  gravitation  only. 

But,  as  substance   does   express   itself  more 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.      33 

and  more  intelligent!}'-,  the  law  of  gravitation 
loses  its  force,  and  the  Law  of  Attraction  is 
substituted.  Thus  all  individual  lives  work 
out  their  own  freedom  through  intellectual 
growth. 

Intellectual  growth  is  the  liberation  from  the 
law  of  gravitation  which  is  the  law  of  death» 
or  rather  the  no-law  of  life ;  because  death  has 
no  law,  but  is  simply  the  negation  of  the  Law 
of  Attraction,  which  is  the  Law  of  Life. 

Man  becomes  more  free  from  the — so-called — 
law  of — so-called — dead  matter  with  every  ac- 
quisition of  intelligence  he  makes ;  and  he  is 
now  approaching  a  plane  of  knowledge  where 
he  will  realize  that  by  the  law  of  attraction  he 
can  break  his  allegiance  to  the  earth  and  float 
in  the  air.  And  this  will  simply  be  the  be- 
ginning of  his  exploits  in  this  direction. 

As  I — from  some  peculiar  and  accidental 
consciousness  of  this  great  truth — actually 
floated  in  the  air,  so  the  time  will  come  in  which 
I  shall  learn  how  I  did  it ;  and  thus  be  able  to 
do  it  again. 

It  is  probable  that  in  my  then  negative   con- 


34  THK    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

dition  a  higher  sense  of  freedom  took  possess- 
ion of  me,  which  my  uneducated  faculties  would 
have  denied,  and  thus  have  frustrated  the  phe- 
nomena, but  that — for  the  time  being — they 
were  inoperative,  and  did  not  put  in  their  ignor- 
ant protest. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  35 

CHAPTER  IV. 


THE  ONE  MIGHTY  FACTOR  IN  RACE  GROWTH  IS 
THOUGHT. 


Man  is  a  compendium  of  all  the  lives  that 
have  existed  before  him ;  but  he  does  not  show- 
forth  the  full  power  of  all  those  individual 
lives.  He  is — in  his  present  stage  of  develop- 
ment— a  compromise  of  them  all. 

The  power  of  all  of  them,  and  vastly  more 
power,  lies  stored  in  his  brain,  but  it  has  not 
yet  been  expressed  in  his  personality.  It  is  in 
his  power  to  express,  and  by  his  intelligent  be- 
lief in  its  presence,  he  will  be  able  to  express  it. 

Belief  in  self  is  the  key  that  unlocks  all  this 
stored  power.  If  I  did  not  believe  I  could  draw 
a  bucket  of  water  out  of  the  well,  I  would  never 
draw  it.  If  I  did  not  believe  I  could  write  an 
article,  I  could  never  write  it.  The  paralytic 
believes  he  cannot  move  his  hand  and  he  does 
not  move  it.  The  Mental  Healer,  in  his  treat- 
ment of   this   disease,  does  not  even   think  of 


36      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

the  hand ;  he  directs  his  thought  to  the  patient's 
brain,  and  corrects  his  mistaken  belief  in  his 
own  power.  All  disease  is  of  the  brain.  A 
belief  in  disease  is  the  brain's  own  under-esti- 
mate  of  its  power.  The  brain  has  weakened  in 
its  belief  of  what  it  is  and  what  it  can  do,  and 
the  body  shows   forth  the  brain's  error. 

A  woman  came  to  me  one  day  with  the  sick- 
ness of  a  decade  in  every  part  of  her  body. 
Long  years  of  a  life  totally  unappreciated  by 
others,  and  a  lack  of  self-esteem  on  her  own 
part,  had  brought  her  to  the  condition  in  which 
I  saw  her.  Her  wonderful  eyes,  and  the  entire 
wreck  of  her  queenly  beauty,  impressed  me 
greatly.  A  few  minutes  conversation  showed 
me  the  situation.  I  did  not  offer  to  treat  her ; 
I  told  her  how  beautiful  and  how  great  she  was. 
I  told  her  what  splendid  possibilities  I  saw  in 
her  mind ;  she  knew  I  was  telling  her  the  truth, 
and  she  was  well  in  that  hour.  Day  by  day 
from  that  time  her  body  showed  forth  her  re- 
newed trust  and  confidence  in  her  own  intellect ; 
her  individuality  strengthened  until  the  nega- 
tions that  had   once   submerged  and  held   her 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  37 

under,  became  the  servants  that  ministered  to 
her  uplifting. 

The  intellect  is  the  shaping  power  in  the 
body.  It  is  true  that  the  body  builds  the 
brain ;  but  the  brain  reciprocates  by  building 
the  body.  Every  higher  thought  a  man  has, 
records  itself  in  some  added  power  in  the  body ; 
and  if  this  could  go  on  day  by  day,  the  body 
would  become  more  and  more  a  revised  edition 
of  a  revised  mode  of  thinking. 

And  just  so,  in  the  opposite  direction,  the 
body  may  and  does  deteriorate. 

How  is  it  that  the  man  of  science  can  take  an 
animal's  skull  and  from  its  shape  tell  us  just 
what  the  animal  was  like,  and  what  it  fed  on, 
and  all  the  particulars  concerning  it?  It  is  be- 
cause the  brain  shapes  the  body ;  and  when  they 
get  a  correct  idea  of  the  brain  from  the  shape 
of  the  skull,  they  have  no  difficulty  in  describ- 
ing the  animal  that  owned  it,  and  naming  the 
family  to  which  it  belonged. 

Familiarity  with  the  correlation  between  the 
brain  of  the  animal  and  the  different  members 
of  the  body  of  the   animal  also   enables   these 


448075 


38  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

men  of  science  to  work  the  same  problem  back- 
wards. They  will  take  any  well-defined  bone 
of  the  aiiimal  and  describe  all  the  animal's 
clearly  marked  characteristics.  The  relation 
between  the  brain  and  the  different  parts  of 
the  body  is  exact. 

Surely  there  is  a  big  lesson  in  this  for  him 
who  thinks.  From  the  very  earliest  forms  of 
organization  clear  up  to  man,  there  has  been  a 
steady  increase  of  brain  power,  and  a  steady  im- 
provement in  the  shape  of  the  head.  Not  in  a 
single  instance  has  there  been  a  sudden  jump 
from  low  to  high.  And  never  has  there  been 
any  real  retrogression.  There  have  been  instan- 
ces in  race  growth  which  seemed  like  retrogres- 
sion, but  which  were  truly  a  kind  of  retrogress- 
ive progression ;  being  but  a  temporary  halt  in 
the  upward  journey  of  the  incessant  brain,  or  a 
going  back  a  few  paces  to  bring  up  the  lagging 
forces. 

There  is  no  missing  link.  Race  growth  has 
been  as  even  and  steady  as  the  growth  of  a 
child  from  infancy  to  manhood.  And  the  one 
factor  in  its  growth  has  been  thought. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  39 

Let  no  one  imagine  that  thought  is  confined 
to  human  beings  alone.  All  creatures  think. 
Animals  think ;  plants  think ;  and  even 
crystals  think.  They  think  the  thoughts  that 
render  them  obedient  to  the  operation  of  the 
Law  of  Attraction,  by  whose  power  they  are 
drawn  into  certain  forms.  The  grass  thinks ; 
it  aspires  or  desires,  and  its  aspirations  or  de- 
sires find  a  ready  response  in  nature,  and  the 
result  is  growth.  Every  upward  step  in  the 
scale  of  creation  is  marked  by  a  greater  power 
of  thought  in  the  creatures ;  and  this  greater 
power  of  thought  produces  more  powerful  creat- 
ures. And  so  thought,  even  in  its  lowest  forms, 
expressed  in  desire,  relates  the  creature,  under 
the  ever  active  Law  of  Attraction,  to  that 
which  it  desires;  and  the  stones  emerge 
into  gigantic  vegetation ;  the  vegetation  be- 
comes concentrated  into  a  drop  of  protoplasm ; 
the  protoplasm,  by  the  same  potency  of 
thought,  expressing  the  ever  growing  desire  for 
an  enlarged  life,  greater  happiness  and  greater 
freedom,  sprouts  a  digestive  system ;  puts  forth 
from  its   body   the  necessary    instruments   by 


40      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

which  to  supply  the  digestive  system  with  food ; 
eyes,  ears,  claws,  legs,  members  both  offensive 
and  defensive,  until  the  ripened  man,  with  his 
noble  brain,  is  here. 

And  still  the  same  system  of  growth  goes  on. 
The  ripened  man  is  man  only  in  his  form ;  the 
strength  and  character  of  his  animal  progeni- 
tors have  passed  into  his  brain  and  live  there 
in  disguise,  or  show  forth  in  cunningly  devised 
methods  for  the  attainment  of  that  power  which 
the  beasts — his  forefathers — took  by  force  of 
muscle  and  cunning.  Society  is  a  compromise 
based  on  fear ;  religion  is  a  superstition  founded 
also  on  fear,  and  rotten  with  hypocrisy. 

And  yet  this  condition  is  only  an  attitude  in 
race  growth,  and  it  is  all  right  for  the  stage  of 
growth  it  represents.  It  is  not  the  desirable 
thing  any  more  than  the  bitter  and  unripe  peach 
is  the  desirable  thing ;  but  it  is  on  the  way  to 
becoming  the  right  thing.  It  will  always  be 
becoming  more  and  more  the  right  thing ;  for 
it,  like  the  individuals  that  compose  it,  is  on 
the  road  of  endless  progression  Forever  ripen- 
ing but   never    ripe;    forever    incarnating    in 


THE  BLOSSOM  OK  THE  CENTURY.      41 

itself  more  and  more  of  the  vast  possibilities 
latent  in  the  Law  of  Being — the  Law  of  Attrac- 
tion— but  never  exhausting  the  fullness  of  the 
Law,  and  therefore  never  ripe. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OK    THE    CENTURY. 

CHAPTER  -v. 


To  think  in  the  old  ruts  is  to  remain  in  the  old 
conditions. 

To  think  expansively  is  to  grow  endlessly  in  the  direc- 
tion of  freedom  and  happiness. 

Death  is  not  growth.     It  solves  no  problem. 

Man  at  this  time  is  all  that  his  animal  pro- 
genitors are,  and  more.  The  strength  of  muscle 
which  they  exhibited,  finds  its  expression  in 
him — in  his  brain  and  not  in  his  muscle.  The 
quality  of  every  faculty  they  possessed  is  con- 
densed in  his  brain ;  in  ceasing  to  become  ani- 
mal, and  in  becoming  more  and  more  _man,  the 
attributes  that  expressed  themselves  in  the 
body  of  animals,  express  themselves  with  ten- 
fold more  force  in  the  brain  of  the  man. 

In  fact,  the  process  of  growth  has  been  a 
process  of  brain  making.  The  awakening  of 
life  from  the  inertia  that  holds  it  obedient  to 
that  downward  attraction  called  the  law  of 
gravitation,  has  been  one  steady  advancement 
of  all  things  toward  brain ;  towards  the  pow- 
er to  think ;  towards  the  freedom  that  thought 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.       43 

alone  can  insure ;  towards  the  conquest  of  envi- 
ronment that  thought  alone  can  master. 

I  am  not  making  an  exaggerated  statement 
when  I  say  that  the  road  of  life,  the  road  of 
progress  is  from  a  belief  in  that  inert  substance 
we  call  matter,  to  a  belief  in  mind. 

This  inert  substance  we  call  matter,  and 
which  is  under  the  (so-called)  law  of  gravi- 
tation, is,  in  point  of  absolute  truth,  all  mind 
or  brain  or  thought;  but  it  is  unawakened 
mind,  and  therefore  unconscious  or  "  dead " 
mind ;  mind  whose  powers  are  latent  or  unex- 
pressed. 

The  steady  effort  of  the  ages  has  been  to  lib- 
erate this  substance  from  its  unconscious  obe- 
dience to  the  "  law  of  gravitation" — the  law  of 
the  dead  to  the  dead — by  awakening  it  to  a  con- 
sciousness of  its  power  to  think ;  thus  demon- 
strating to  it  that  it  is  mind,  living  and  active 
and  free,  subject  to  the  Law  of  Attraction  only, 
instead  of  being  dead  matter. 

I  cannot  repeat  too  often  the  great  fact  that 
there  is  no  dead  matter ;  that  there  is  no  death 
in  the  universe  ;  that  what  we  call  dead  matter 


44      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

is  unawakened  mind ;  that  every  atom  in  the 
world  is  mind,  either  awakened  to  a  sense  of  its 
own  power,  or  holding  its  power  in  the  uncon- 
sciousness of  latency.  It  is  on  this  mighty 
truth  that  man's  salvation  depends. 

What  we  call  matter  is  the  recognition  of 
something.  Every  atom  of  it  is  a  magnet.  A 
magnet  is  that  which  recognizes  the  Law  of  At- 
traction within  itself.  If  the  recognition  is  so 
feeble  that  it  yields  obedience  only  to  that  com- 
paratively unintelligent  force  expressed  in  bulk 
and  weight,  it  recognizes  bulk  and  weight,  and 
yields  its  recognition  to  it,  and  is  then  said  to 
be  under  the  law  of  gravitation. 

But  no  matter  what  it  recognizes,  the  fact 
that  it.  recognizes  anything  at  all  proves  that  it 
is  mind.  Dead  matter  cannot  recognize.  Rec- 
ognition is  a  faculty  of  mind. 

The  Law  of  Being,  the  Law  of  Attraction,  ex- 
ists. No  one  knows  anything  about  it  except 
that  it  exists. 

It  is  that  unseen  principle  running  through 
all  things,  and  to  whose  power  man  can  add 
nothing.     It  is  unchangeable.     Our  recognition 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  45 

or  comprehension  of  it  changes  constantly,  but 
it  never  changes. 

All  nature  with  man  at  its  head  is  the  recog- 
nition or  the  comprehension  of  this  Law.  Not 
a  perfect  recognition  or  comprehension  of  it ; 
it  can  never  be  perfectly  comprehended ;  but 
a  partial  and  constantly  improving  and  grow- 
ing comprehension  of  it. 

Men  call  this  Law  of  Attraction  God ;  but 
the  word  is  unscientific  and  misleading.  Sub- 
stitute the  word  "Law"  for  "God"  in  Pope's 
lines  and  they  would  explain  all. 

"The  universe  is  one  stupendous  whole 
Whose  body  Nature  is,  and  God  the  soul." 

As  our  bodies  are  the  perception,  or  the  un- 
derstanding, or  the  recognition  of  our  spirits,  so 
is  all  nature  the  perception,  or  the  understand- 
ing, or  the  recognition  of  this  Infinite  Spirit; 
being  the  unseen  Life  Principle  which  I  call 
the  Law  of  Attraction  or  the  Law  of  Being. 

Understanding,  recognition,  the  power  to 
perceive  does  not  belong  to  anything  but  mind ; 
therefore,  all  visible  things  are  mind ;  no  mat- 
ter how  apparently  dead  this  substance  called 
matter  may  seem,  the  Law  of  Attraction    is   la- 


46  THK    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

tent  in  it,  and  in  the  farther  process  of  evolu- 
tion it  will  recognize  the  fact,  thus  proving  that 
it  is  mind. 

And  mind,  no  matter  how  crude  it  may  be, 
is  one  form  of  brain  out  of  which  the  higher  or 
governing  brain  proceeds ;  the  brain  which  be- 
gets the  intelligent  will ;  whose  mandate  governs 
the  entire  body. 

It  may  be  said  that  nature  is  all  brain,  rang- 
ing numberless  degrees  from  coarse  to  fine, 
from  the  crudest  substance  to  the  highest 
thought,  as  water  ranges  from  solid  ice  to  the 
invisible  gas  generated  by  steam. 

That  wonderfully  volatile  fluid  we  call  elec- 
tricity is,  in  its  own  way  a  certain  form,  and 
a  very  vital  form  of  recognition  of  the  Law  of 
Attraction ;  and  is  therefore  mind,  brain,  in- 
telligence or  thought. 

Nature  being  in  all  particulars  the  recogni- 
tion of  that  vital  Principle  called  the  Law  of 
Attraction,  it  will  be  seen  that  she  is  all  mind, 
whose  power  to  grow  lies  in  her  continued  pow- 
er to  think  more  intelligently  than  she  has 
previously  thought. 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.       47 

Our  visible  world  has  now  thought  herself 
up  to  her  present  position,  which  is  a  higher 
point  of  intelligence  than  she  has  ever  reached 
before.  From  the  fiery  mass  that  she  was  in 
our  first  knowledge  of  her,  where  the  Law  of 
Attraction  between  the  atoms  seemed  so  feeble 
in  its  power,  because  so  little  recognized,  that 
it  appeared  to  be  rather  a  law  of  repulsion,  on 
up  through  every  grade  of  ripening  recogni- 
tion of  the  Law,  with  its  consequent  forms  of 
greater  intelligence,  we  have  come  to  this  our 
present  plane  of  thought. 

And  right  here,  in  spite  of  our  past  record 
with  its  unflagging  development  in  every  di- 
rection, there  are  thousands  of  our  people  who 
affirm  that  the  world  has  ceased  growing. 

Or  rather  I  may  say  there  are  tens  of  thou- 
sands, nay  millions,  who  do  not  know  that  the 
whole  visible  world  is  a  growth  in  the  under- 
standing of  the  Law  of  Being ;  who  do  not  be- 
lieve it ;  and  who  are  therefore  unprepared  to 
accept  the  statement  that  her  position  in  growth 
is  still  in  its  infancy,  and  that  her  power  to 
keep  on  growing  is  endless. 


48       THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

But,  whether  they  accept  it  or  not,  it  is  true ; 
and  any  truth  even  approaching  the  glory  of 
this  truth  has  never  been  announced  before. 

The  visible  world  grows  by  its  acquisition  of 
intelligence ;  or  rather  by  its  development  out 
of  itself  of  more  and  more  power  to  recognize 
the  unfailing,  the  infinite  possibilities  of  the 
Law  of  Attraction,  which  is  the  Law  of 
Being. 

Thus,  the  potency  of  mind  increases  daily ; 
and  as  it  increases,  its  environments  give  way, 
and  .happiness  and  freedom  come  more  readily 
within  its  grasp. 

The  idea  that  the  race  has  achieved  even  a 
minimum  of  the  power  that  is  in  store  for  it  is 
absurd. 

The  idea  that  the  race  must  continue  to  wear 
its  fetters  because  they  are  "God  imposed"  is  still 
more  absurd. 

Man  has  no  fetters  but  those  of  his  own  ig- 
norance, and  nothing  but  intelligence  will  liber- 
ate him  from  such  fetters. 

You  may  take  from  him  every  visible  environ- 
ment; you  may   heap  him   with   wealth;   you 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.      49 

may  place  him  in  high  position ;  but,  unless  he 
has  come  into  the  saving  knowledge  which  an 
intellectual  perception  of  his  own  boundless  re- 
sources yields  him,  he  is  not  free.  Ignorance 
still  holds  him  and  will  pull  him  down  to  old 
age,  feebleness  and  the  grave. 

And  what  but  these — old  age,  feebleness  and 
the  grave — are  our  real  fetters?  What  have  we 
gained  though  we  conquer  everything  else,  and 
these  remain?  It  may  be  that  the  spirit  sur- 
vives the  body,  as  spiritualism  believes  it  has 
demonstrated ;  but,  even  in  this  case,  a  man's 
sphere  of  activities  is  removed  from  his  work- 
shop, the  earth ;  and  his  death  is  a  break  in 
what  should  be  an  unbroken  line  of  growth. 

I  do  not  believe  that  true,  healthy  growth  can 
proceed  through  the  tortuous  weakness  of  old 
age,  decrepitude  and  death.  True  intelligence, 
the  farther  recognition  of  the  Law,  which  alone 
is  growth,  is  not  in  these  conditions.  Nothing 
is  in  these  conditions  but  the  denial  or  the  non- 
recognition  of  the  Law;  which  is  a  slipping 
back  from  a  certain  condition  of  incarnate  in- 
telligence into  a  condition  of  ignorance  where- 


50  THE    BLOSSOM      OF    THE    CENTURY. 

in  the  previous  condition  of  intelligence,  the 
incarnate  condition  of  it,  is  denied  or  can- 
celled. 

Even  in  this  denial  or  cancellation  of  the 
previous  condition,  it  may  be  that  the  spirit 
survives,  and  I  believe  it  does ;  but,  I  do  not  be- 
lieve that  the  person  has  gained  by  the  change  ; 
indeed,  I  feel  certain  that  he  has  lost ;  and 
though  the  loss  may  not  be  irreparable,  yet  it 
is  a  mighty  loss,  and  ought  to  be  avoided. 

And  it  can  be  avoided. 

If  I  did  not  know  that  the  loss  of  the  body — 
which  is  the  condensed  bulk  of  the  man's  be- 
liefs— could  be  avoided,  I  would  never  have  writ- 
ten so  much  as  the  first  line  of  this  paper. 

But  I  do  know  it. 

I  have  frequently  been  asked  to  establish  this 
statement  by  producing  an  instance  in  which 
some  one  had  conquered  death. 

There  was  a  time  when  there  was  no  animal 
life  on  this  planet  at  all ;  did  the  fact  that 
there  was  none  then  form  a  true  basis  of  belief 
that  there  would  never  be  any? 

Because  the  Cave  dwellers  had  never  produced 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.       51 

a  Plato,  was  that  a  valid  reason  for  supposing 
that  there  would  never  be  one? 

Those  who  are  limited  to  a  belief  that  the 
race  is  ripe,  and  that  there  will  be  no  farther 
development  than  there  has  already  been,  are 
in  no  condition  either  to  deny  or  affirm  the 
statements  I  am  prepared  to  make  on  this  sub- 
ject. They  do  not  know  that  the  race  is  a 
growth.  They  have  never  examined  its  past 
history;  this  history  that  began  millions  of 
years  before  it  actually  appeared  in  its  present 
form ;  and  their  (tpinions,  as  weighed  against  the 
opinion  of  one  who  has  learned  the  situation  by 
heart,  are  absolutely  worthless, 

I  have  studied  this  matter  of  race  growth  for 
many  years.  I  began  to  be  the  race's  cham- 
pion and  defender  when  a  child.  I  was  scarcely 
out  of  my  teens  before  a  burning  sense  of  dis- 
gust for  the  foolish  and  false  theologies  of  the 
day  took  pos7e8sion  of  me.  I  knew  that  we 
were  not  willful  sinners  against  a  higher  power? 
but  simply  ignorant  children  feeling  our  way 
through  intellectual  darkness,  and  stumbling 
at  every  step.     Without  knowing  it,  having   no 


52  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

positive  information  by  which  to  bolster  up 
my  belief  on  this  subject,  I  simply  held  to  it 
because  it  was  part  of  me,  and  I  could  no  more 
get  rid  of  it  than  I  could  get  rid  of  my  head. 
It  became  the  dominant  force  of  my  existence, 
and  the  chief  source  of  my  vitality.  In  the 
midst  of  sickness,  it  kept  me  whole ;  in  posi- 
tions that  would  have  been  death  to  another, 
I  was  unscathed. 

In  point  of  fact,  it  was  nothing  more  than  a 
larger  seeing,  a  deeper  recognition  of  the  Life 
Principle  than  that  possessed  by  the  average 
man. 

Having  more  life  I  felt  more  life,  and  death 
seemed  farther  away  and  more  indefinite  to 
me  than  to  others. 

As  I  grew  older,  the  possibility  of  avoiding  it 
entirely  began  to  take  form  in  my  intelligence. 
It  was  not  that  I  feared  death,  for  it  never 
seemed  sufficiently  real  to  fear.  '  The  idea  of 
overcoming  it  came  to  me  as  a  part  of  my 
growth,  in  which  it  seemed  better  to  acquiesce 
consciously,  so  that  I  might  thereby  note  every 
step  of  its  progress.     Naturally  observant  and 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY       53 

introspective  I  was  curious  about  it ;  all  my 
interest  was  aroused  and  something  firmer 
than  interest,  a  deep-seated  determination  to 
carry  the  thing  through  to  success  became  a 
fixed  factor  of  my  mind. 

It  is  strange  how,  by  simply  holding  an  idea 
or  belief,  it  aggregates  to  itself  certain  mental 
building  material  until  it  stands  impregnable 
and  apparently  deathless.  This  is  now  the 
condition  of  my  belief  in  the  possibility  of  im- 
mortality in  the  flesh.  I  have  not  read  books, 
I  have  not  sought  outside  of  myself  for  rea- 
sons to  strengthen  my  position  ;  I  have  held  to 
it  simply  because  it  has  held  to  me ;  and  out  of 
my  own  organism  has  been  unfolded  the  course 
of  reasoning  by  which  I  have  demonstrated  its 
truth  to  myself.  I  believe  in  it  as  firmly  as  I 
believe  in  my  personal  presence  in  this  room ; 
and  the  world  is  going  to  believe  it  before 
many   years   shall  pass. 

It  is  true  that  the  spirit  of  Malthus  is  wide- 
spread at  this  stage  of  human  development, 
and  questions  are  frequent  as  to  what  will  be- 
come  of  the  earth's  overflowing  population    if 


54  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

immortality  in  the  flesh  should  become  pos- 
sible. 

The  natural  Malthusian  is  one  who  has  not 
penetrated  even  to  the  slightest  degree  into 
the  realm  of  the  Ideal,  where  alone  immortality 
in  the  flesh  can  become  possible.  He  does  not 
know  that  life,  when  lifted  from  its  belief  in  the 
deadness  of  matter,  enters  the  thought  realm, 
in  which  the  supply  is  equal  to  the  demand. 

But  this  is  so.  As  soon  as  a  man  steps  up 
from  a  belief  in  matter  as  dead  substance,  and 
perceives  that  all  is  life,  and  that  every  form 
of  life  is  on  the  wing,  as  it  were,  from  lower  to 
higher,  and  that  there  is  no  stagnation  possible 
to  growth,  he  will  then  know  that  the  earth  will 
not  be  overcrowded  by  a  too  rapidly  accumulat- 
ing population. 

The  old  saying  that  "there  is  room  at  the 
top"  applies  here.  The  pioneers  in  civilization 
or  in  thought,  always  find  themselves  rather 
lonesome  than  otherwise.  The  space  outside  of 
the  herds  is  unlimited.  Especially  is  this  true 
in  the  realm  of  thought ;  the  realm  of  the  ideal, 
which  we  are  now  on  the  verge  of  entering. 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.      55 

It  is  true  that  the  world  would  soon  become 
overcrowded  if  people  should  keep  producing 
children  who  would  never  die,  unless  some  way 
should  be  provided  for  them  to  leave  the  earth. 

But  the  entire  range  of  creation  is  open  to 
mian,  and  there  is  nothing  but  his  ignorance 
of  his  own  powers  and  privileges  that  will  keep 
him  in  one  place. 

It  is  true  that  no  God  will  ever  interfere  in 
his  behalf  to  lift  him  into  more  enlarged  spheres 
of  activity ;  but  no  God  will  ever  prohibit  him 
from  lifting  himself  into  these  spheres. 

Indeed,  such  lifting  is  correlated  to  the  man's 
lifted  and  enlarged  thought.  As  the  man  ex- 
pands in  his  thought  life,  he  will  be  met  by 
more  expansive  conditions ;  and  the  possibility 
of  fettering  him  to  one  point  in  the  universe 
will  cease.  It  is  by  thought  expansion  that  a 
man's  fetters  fall  from  him. 

Thought  is  the  conqueror  of  everything  that 
hampers  and  binds.  It  cannot  make  even  the 
smallest  conquest  over  its  surroundings  that  it 
does  not  come  at  once  into  relation  with  exter- 


53      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

nal  conditions  better  suited  to  its  enlarged 
sense  of  freedom. 

Indeed,  it  almost  seems  as  if  these  freer  con- 
ditions constantly  pressed  in  on  the  thought 
of  the  race,  as  if  consciously  resolved  to  be  re- 
cognized. 

The  cro«,ker8  of  the  world  cried  out  that  the 
coal  beds  were  becoming  exhausted  and  that 
the  race  was  doomed  in  consequence.  A  wider 
range  of  thought  was  correlated  by  the  sub- 
stance of  electricity  and  the  world  came  out  of 
its  nervous  chill  on  the  subject  of  coal. 

Because  balloons  have  proved  a  failure  does 
any  one  suppose  that  the  air  will  never  be  navi- 
gated? Even  if  gas  and  machinery  fail  to  ac- 
complish this  thiLg,  there  is  a  power  latent  in 
man's  organism  that  will  do  it ;  namely,  the 
power  of  thought  to  which  all  substances  are 
negative. 

immortality  in  the  flesh  would  be  neither 
possible  nor  desirable  if  man  were  to  remain 
the  helpless  and  ignorant  creature  that  he  now 
is. 

It  would  not  be  desirable  because  the  universe 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  57 

can  furnish  no  excuse  for  the  perpetuation  of 
ignorance.  It  would  not  be  possible  because 
ignorance  is  death  already ;  at  least,  it  is  the 
nearest  approach  to  death  that  Life  renders 
possible. 

To  keep  the  race  forever  alive  in  its  present 
animalized  condition  would  be  to  perpetuate  ig- 
norance ;to  keep  it  as  a  stagnant  pool  in  the  heart 
of  universal  progression ;  and  this  could  not 
be.  Perpetual  change  is  the  order  of  Life.  He 
who  catches  on  to  higher  thought  and  holds  it 
with  a  faith  so  firm  that  it  crystallizes  into  be- 
lief, is  on  the  upward  move  where  higher  in- 
fluences meet  him,  and  fix  his  thought  in 
tangible  substance. 

He  who  turns  from  his  higher  thought, 
doubting  its  practicability,  pinches  himself  in- 
to constantly  lowering  conditions,  until  he  is 
pinched  out.  There  is  progression  for  the  one, 
and  at  least  a  temporary  retrogression  for  the 
other ;  but  there  is  no  standing  still.  Therefore, 
immortality  in  the  present  status  of  universal 
race  thought  here  in  this  world  is  not  possible 
now. 


58       THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

But  the  dawn  of  it  is  here.  The  beginning 
of  that  credence  in  the  human  ideal,  which  alone 
will  usher  it  in,  is  here.  It  is  here  for  no  less 
a  reason  than  because  woman  with  her  strong- 
ly intuitional  nature  has  come  to  the  front. 
Woman  has  brought  the  morning  of  a  new 
era  with  her ;  and  as  her  feet  obtain  firmer 
standing  in  the  slushy  quagmire  of  the  world's 
present  condition  of  thought,  the  morning  of 
her  day  will  brighten  into  the  full  splendor  of 
a  noon  that  will  arrest  and  hold  the  entire  in- 
terest of  the  millions  of  dying  souls  about    us. 

This  much  is  already  accomplished.  The 
beginning  of  the  dawn  is  here.  Universal 
thought  has  begun  to  move.  A  ripple  runs 
along  the  full  length  of  its  connected  links, 
even  though  it  is  only  the  few  who  stand  in 
the  front  that  are  capable  of  seeing  the  light 
that  shines  so  brightly  ahead. 

If  this  movement  had  to  be  confined  to  our 
earth,  as  the  Malthusians  all  must  imagine, 
then  its  scope  would  be  so  small  as  to  furnish 
a  reason  for  their  doubts.  But  because  man's 
growth  is  limitless,  and  by   his  ever  increasing 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.       59 

power  of  thought  I  know  that  his  growth  is  limit- 
lesSjthe  fact  shadows  forth  the  possibility  of  his 
leaving  the  earth  when  he  shall  have  learned 
how  to  do  so. 

More  than  this.  In  the  economy  of  Nature, 
the  time  will  come  when  generation  will  lose 
itself  in  regeneration. 

Conditions  adapt  themselves  to  each  other. 
When  one  thread  is  spun  out  there  is  another 
thread  waiting  there  to  meet  the  out-stretched 
hand  of  him  who  has  resolved  to  go  ahead.  To 
him  who  is  not  so  resolved,  and  who  does  not 
know  his  power  to  go  on,  though  the  thread 
is  there,  it  is  not  there  for  him,  because  he 
does  not  see  it.  And  so  he  falls ;  not  because 
Life  was  lacking,  but  because  the  individual  in- 
telligence with  which  he  should  have  grasped 
it  was  wanting. 


60  THE    BLOSSOM    OF  THE    CENTURY. 

CHAPTER  VI. 


DESIRE    THE    ORGANIZING   PRINCIPLE. 


•  Since  the  first  two  atoms  came  together  under 
the  Law  of  Attraction  and  produced  the  earliest 
specimen  of  individual  life  upon  our  planet,  the 
vitality  of  the  race  has  been  slowly  ripening 
up  to  the  point  where  immortality  in  the  flesh 
could  become  a  possible  thing.  As  the  vital 
powers  have  ripened,  conditions  have  also  rip- 
ened to  meet  the  needs  of  more  vital  creatures, 
and  thus  the  supply  has  been  equal  to  the  de- 
mand. 

Indeed,  the  saying  that  the  supply  is  equal  to 
the  demand  is  grounded  in  the  principle  of  the 
law  of  attraction.  It  is  one  of  the  absolute 
truths. 

Whether  what  I  call  the  life  of  immortality 
in  the  flesh  is  desirable  or  practical  hinges  on 
one  point.  If  the  substance  all  about  us  that 
we  see  in  existing  forms  of  life,  the  forms  of 
minerals,  plants  and   animals  is  dead  matter, 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  61 

infused  by  living  spirit,  then  our  only  hope  of 
prolonging  our  lives  will  be  by  some  method 
that  will  release  the  spirit  from  the  matter. 
And  this  position  is  accepted  as  the  truth  al- 
most the  whole  world  over. 

Dead  matter  can  never  be  permanently  enliv- 
ened by  spirit,  nor  is  it  desirable  that  spirit 
should  load  itself  down  with  something  that  is 
iorever  dead.  Moreover,  if  this  is  the  true  con- 
dition, it  never  has  been  necessary  for  spirit  to 
be  so  loaded  with  the  dead  weight  of  matter ; 
and  the  entire  combination  has  been  a  very 
grave  mistake,  ruining  the  happiness  of  every 
spirit  that  ever  entered  the  material  life. 

If  I  knew  this  to  be  the  true  situation,  I 
would  never  move  my  hand  to  save  my  own 
life ;  I  would  look  forward  to  the  time  when  my 
spirit  would  drop  its  load  of  death  as  the 
chained  and  barred  prisoner  looks  forward  to 
the  hope  of  freedom. 

Long  and  earnestly  I  pondered  the  subject  of 
dead  matter  with  its  infusion  of  living  spirit, 
and  wondered  why  a  union  of  two  things  so 
diametrically   opposite  to  each  other  should  be 


62  THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

either  necessary  or  desirable.  Presently,  I  knew 
that  it  could  not  be;  because,  if  matter  is 
dead,  then  the  Law  of  Attraction  cannot  exist 
in  it,  and  it  is  absolutely  immovable  by  any 
force  whatever.  It  has  no  power  to  respond 
to  spirit ;  it  is  helpless,  without  the  principle 
of  cohesion,  and  entirely  useless  in  the  build- 
ing of  worlds  or  of  men. 

In  this  thought,  which  I  knew  to  be  correct, 
I  touched  the  negative  pole  of  the  truth  I  was 
seeking. 

If  matter  was  a  dead  substance,  it  was  dead, 
and  there  was  no  inherent  power  in  it;  and  no 
latent  life.  It  was  simply  dead,  and  had  no 
place  whatever  in  the  universe  of  uses.  That 
the  substance  called  matter  did  exist,  there 
was  no  denying,  even  through  the  visionary 
process  of  Christian  Science.  The  substance 
existed ;  it  was  an  ever  present  and  an  in- 
dispensable reality. 

''Indispensable;  "  this  was  a  fortunate  word. 
Dead  matter  could  not  be  indispensable ;  the 
sooner  dead  matter  and  every  form  of  death 
should  be  dispensed  with,  the  better. 


THE  BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  63 

What  then  was  the  substance  called  dead 
matter?  Did  it  have  life  of  itself  ?  I  answer 
'^Yes." 

Then,  if  it  has  life  of  itself,  what  need  has  it 
of  the  infusing  spirit  which  seems  to  be  a  differ- 
ent thing  from  it;  the  infusing  spirit  that 
only  infuses  it  a  few  years  and  then  deserts  it ; 
leaving  it  to  be  again  infused  by  other  spirits 
or  to  remain  forever  helpless? 

The  more  I  pondered  on  this  subject,  the 
more  I  became  convinced  that  matter  had  life 
of  itself. 

To  have  life  is  to  be  capable  of  thought. 
This  proposition  brought  me  face  to  face  with 
the  great  truth  that  every  atom  in  the  universe 
had  power  to  think.  In  other  words,  that  every 
atom  WKS  transfused  with  the  law  of  attraction 
and  responsive  to  every  other  atom ;  and  on  this 
fact  alone  rested  the  possibility  of  organized 
forms. 

By  slow  degrees  and  never-ceasing  thought,  I 
soon  found  myself  in  an  immaterial  universe. 
That  is,  in  a  universe  where  all  is  living,  active 
vital  intelligence,  or  mind,  or  thought,  or  brain 
or  knowledge. 


r 

64  THE  BLOSSOM   01<'  THE   CENTURY. 

Each  atom  was  not  a  dead  thing  that  knew 
something ;  it  was  not  a  dead  thing  that  yet 
had  the  power  to  recognize  the  transfusing  prin- 
ciple of  life  within  it ;  if  it  was  dead,  it  could 
not  recognize  anything.  But  still  it  existed 
and  was  responsive  to  other  atoms ;  what,  then, 
was  it? 

It  was  mind  itself ;  and  mind,  which  is  the 
recognition  of  the  law  of  attraction,  or  the 
law's  recognition  of  itself,  was  substance;  ac- 
tual substance  to  be  seen  and  handled ;  to  (ex- 
press in  its  own  appearance  its  own  belief  in 
the  law,  or  as  much  of  the  law  as  it  could  com- 
prehend. 

Here,  all  in  an  hour,  the  whole  system  of 
evolution  opened  up  to  me.  The  external 
world,  the  world  of  mind,  is  in  constant  effort 
to  know  more  and  more  of  the  Law  of  Being, 
the  Law  of  Attraction,  which  is  the  principle  of 
life  ;  the  unseen  side  of  itself ;  the  positive  and 
unchangeable  I  AM;  the  constantly  growing 
recognition  of  which  gives  ever-improving  ex- 
pressions of  itself,  from  the  smallest  and  weak- 
est individualized  life  up  to  man ;    and   from 


THE   BLOSSOM    OF   THE   CENTUliY.  66 

man  as  he  now  stands  in  his  ignorance  and 
helplessness  up  through  an  unending  process  of 
improvement,  by  a  constant  acquisition  of  new 
truths,  or  an  ever-widening  recognition  of  the 
power  of  the  Law. 

The  Law  of  Being  or  of  Attraction  is  to  the 
visible  universe  what  heat  is  to  light.  It  is  the 
magnetism  in  the  magnet.  Every  atom  is  a 
magnet,  and  the  external  or  visible  part  of  it 
is  the  magnet's  recognition  of  itself,  just  as 
light   is   heat's   recognition    of  itself 

All  power  is  in   the  law. 

By  all  power,  I  mean  all  power  of  organiza- 
tion. 

In  our  first  knowledge  of  the  world,  as  stated 
before,  the  atoms  were  so  widely  diffused  as  to 
be  almost  beyond  the  reach  of  each  other's  at- 
traction. Ages  passed ;  and  the  law — always 
constant  to  itself  in  its  drawing  power — had  con- 
defised  the  fiery  mass  somewhat ;  had  brought 
the  atoms  closer  together,  so  that  its  drawing 
influence  began  to  have  a  greater  effect.  Then 
as  the  ages  went  by,  the  drawing  power  over- 
came the  distances  more  and  more,  and  masses 
berzan  to  assume    form. 


66       THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

Through  this  same  process,  always  increasing 
in  strength,  the  world  was  brought  to  a  condi- 
tion where  it  became  possible  for  higher  concep- 
tions of  the  Law  to  be  formed.  Rocks  adhered ; 
waters  gathered  themselves  together ;  a  blade  of 
grass  put  up  its  daring  head,  and  the  first  pro- 
test of  intelligence  against  bulk  and  weight,  the 
first  rebellion  against  death  recorded  its  tiny 
oath. 

But  the  poor  baby  life  did  die ;  recognizing 
nothing  but  the  first  faint  monition  of  endless 
individuality,  its  little  effort  lost  itself  to  be- 
come merged  in  another   and  greater  effort. 

And  so  one  species  merged  into  a  nobler  one; 
one  genus  disappeared,  because  its  power  to 
recognize  nothing  farther  of  the  possibilities  of 
the  Law  became  its  environment ;  an  environ- 
ment that  nothing  but  dissolution  could  break. 

But  always  the  power  of  the  Law  was  drawing 
the  atoms  to  closer  cohesion ;  and  the  atoms 
thus  cohering,  were,  by  their  very  existence, 
proving  the  greater  potency  of  individuals  to 
recognize  the  Law  of  Being  or  the  Law  of  At- 
traction. 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.      67 

And  so  the  recognition  of  the  Law  of  Attrac- 
tion or  of  Being  has  proceeded  right  through 
the  aees ;  and  so  it  can  continue  to  proceed. 

And  although  recognition  of  the  Law  is  the 
externalizing  power,  the  power  that  makes  visi- 
ble, or  makes  the  showing  forth  of  the  Law,  it 
is  a  fact'that  up  to  the  present  time,  this  re- 
cognition has  been  an  unconscious  recognition ; 
by  which,  I  mean  a  recognition  that  has  express- 
ed itself  in  uses,  and  not  a  recognition  that 
could  give  a  logical  account  of  itself,  and  there- 
by become  a  conscious  recognition. 

Life  has  heretofore  proceeded  entirely  on  the 
unconscious  plane.  It  has  proceeded  in  the  in- 
dividual by  the  individual's  recognition  of  its 
own  desires. 

Desire  is  the  organizing  principle ;  from  first 
to  last  it  has  been  so. 

The  recognition  of  desire  is  the  recognition 
of  the  Law  as  expressed  individually.  It  is 
the  individual's  recognition  of  the  magnetic  or 
attracting  power  which  he  sees  within  himself- 
He  recognizes  this  attraction  or  magnetism  in 
himself  and  it  becomes  the  law  of   his    Individ- 


68      THK  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

ual  life.  It  is  that  unseen  something  within 
him  that  always  cries  out  for  something  more 
than  he  already  possesses.  It  is  the  principle  ot 
life ;  the  growing  principle ;  and  his  recognition 
of  it,  has  brought  him  steadidly  up  through  the 
centuries  from  the  lowest  and  frailest  condi- 
tion imaginable  to  his  present  form,  intelli- 
gence and  strength. 

In  obedience  to  his  unconscious  recognition 
of  this  life  principle  expressed  individually  as 
desire — he,  as  the  tiny  drop  of  protoplasm, 
acquired  a  digestive  system  and  all  the  appen- 
dages necessary  to  supply  it  with  food. 

In  obedience  to  his  love  of  life  or  his  desire 
to  have  his  life  perpetuated,  his  organism  pro- 
duced a  reproductive  system ;  which  as  yet,  on- 
ly serves  a  part  of  his  purpose;  since  it  is 
only  far  enough  evolved  to  perpetuate  his 
Vind  without  perpetuating  himself. 

While  generation  proceeds  in  one  unbroken 
stream  on  the  unconscious  plane  of  life,  regen- 
eration is  not  possible  except  upon  the  con- 
scious plane ;  a  plane  that  the  race  is  now  on 
the  verge  of   reaching. 


THE    BLOSSOM  OF    THE    CENTURY.  69 

All  growth  depends  upon  the  recognition  of  the 
Law.  But  no  thing  and  no  man  can  recognize 
the  Law  in  its  fullness.  Man  only  recognizes 
the  Law  in  himself  as  it  is  expressed  in  desire. 

The  recognition  of  my  desires  is  the  recogni- 
tion of  the  Law  in  my  own  life,  as  separate  and 
apart  from  the  Law  expressed  in  other  lives. 

The  desires  I  see  in  myself  are  evidence  of 
my  own  selfhood.  They  form  my  ego.  That 
I  am  not  in  all  particulars  like  my  neighbor  is 
because  my  desires  differ  from  his ;  I  recognize 
in  the  Law  more  good  than  he  does,  and  there- 
by show  forth  an  organization  superior  to  his ; 
or,  recognize  less  good,  and  show  forth  an  or- 
ganization inferior  to  his ;  or  each  of  us  may 
recognize  an  equal  amount  of  good,  but  of  dif- 
ferent kinds,  and  may  show  forth  organiza- 
tions equally  good,  but  different  from  each 
other. 

And  this  has  been  the  case  all  down  the  scale 
of  being ;  a  blade  of  grass  shows  forth  as  much 
good  as  it  recognizes ;  so  does  a  tree,  a  horse  or 
an  angle  worm. 

Our  bodies  are  the   records   of  our  beliefs; 


70      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

and  just  to  the  extent  that  we  have  believed  in 
our  desires,  which  are  the  Law  individualized 
within  us,  we  have  been  true  to  the  Law,  or 
the  principle  of  growth,  and  have  manifested 
that  which  seemed  good  to  us ;  therefore,  I  say 
that  as  much  "good"  as  we  have  recognized  in 
the  Law,  we  have  shown  forth  in  our  bodies ; 
thus  making  our  bodies  the  record  of  what  we 
desired  and  believed  in. 

The  forms  of  life  have  been  growing  more 
complex  from  the  first  inception  of  the  first 
form,  which  was  nothing  more  than  the  cohe- 
sion through  the  Law  of  Attraction  of  two  or 
three  of  the  primordial  life  cells 

They  have  been  growing  more  complex  be- 
cause as  they  aggregated  to  themselves  more 
and  still  more  of  the  life  cells,  their  desires 
became  more  numerous.  This  increase  in  the 
number  and  character  of  their  desires  was  all 
the  time  making  more  powerful  magnets  of 
them  ;  and  so  evolution  proceeded. 

Every  visible  manifestation  of  life,  mineral^ 
plant  and  animal,  is  self-created. 

Life  is  twofold.    On  the  unseen  side,  we  have 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  71 

the  Law  of  Being  or  the  Principle  of  Life, 
which  is  the  Law  of  Attraction.  No  man 
knows  anything  about  it  except  that  it  simply 
exists.  We  see  its  effects  in  the  magnet;  we 
see  that  every  life  cell  is  a  magnet,  and  we 
know  that  it  is  both  external  and  internal; 
both  seen  and  unseen ;  both  positive  and  nega- 
tive. The  positive  side  being  the  Law,  which 
is  unchanging ;  the  negative  side  being  the  rec- 
ognition of  the  Law,  which  is  the  external 
side,  and  which  is  constantly  changing  through 
the  growing  or  lessening  power  of  individual 
recognition. 

The  more  an  individual  recognizes  of  the 
Law,  the  more  positive  he  becomies.  Man,  re- 
cognizing more  of  the  Law  than  any  other  crea- 
ture, is  positive  to  all  other  creatures;  and 
being  positive  to  them,  he  is  their  master. 
They  feed  him  in  all  his  many  wants.  He 
cuts  down  the  magnificent  tree  and  holds  its 
individuality  in  subservience  to  his  needs ;  he 
kills  the  noble  animal  and  eats  its  flesh  in 
order  to  satisfy  his  desire  for  food ;  he  becomes 
greater  and  stronger  all  the  time  by  sacrificing 


72      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

lives  that  are  negative  to  him.  These  lower 
lives  pass  constantly  into  his  life;  his  life 
would  pass  into  some  life  higher  than  his  own, 
but  for  the  fact  that  his  constantly  growing 
brain  renders  unnecessary  any  life  higher  than 
his.  If  his  brain  found  its  limitation  in  serv- 
ing a  non-expanding  range  of  uses  like  those 
of  the  cow  or  the  horse,  then  nature  would  be- 
get an  organization  superior  to  his. 

But  it  is  not  necessary,  and  therefore  there 
will  be  no  higher  organization,  except  that 
into  which  his  present  organization  will  ex- 
pand by  the  farther  expansion  of  his  brain ; 
or  his  farther  recognition  of  still  greater  power 
existing  in  the  Law. 

Intelligence  or  mind  is  the  visible  substance 
of  the  universe ;  and  it  is  simply  the  recogni- 
tion of  the  Law  of  Being,  which  is  the  Law  of 
Attraction,  or  the  Life  Principle. 

Another  statement  of  this  idea  would  be 
that  the  words  "Love"  and  "Intelligence"  are 
an  explanation  of  it  all.  Love  being  the  un- 
seen principle  of  cohesion,  and  intelligence  the 
recognition  of  this    principle.     The    idea    ex- 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  73 

pressed  in  this  manner  is  not  new ;  it  forms 
the  basis  of  Swedenborg's  theory,  a  theory 
that  he  fails  to  carry  out  into  particulars  in  his 
very  voluminous  writings. 

The  entire  trend  of  thought  is  from  physi- 
cal to  metaphysical ;  and  it  cannot  be  other- 
wise since  race  growth  is  in  this  direction. 

A  belief  in  the  physical  as  dead  matter  is 
all  that  now  holds  the  race  back  from  the  most 
rapid  and  startling  growth.  Freedom — the 
goal  of  the  world's  desire,  lies  just  ahead,  and 
here  we  remain  tethered  to  a  mistake,  a  mis- 
take that  could  not  hold  us  one  moment,  but 
for  the  fact  that  we  are  all  mind,  and  that  our 
mistakes  are  our  bodies.  Our  mistakes  are  our 
beliefs ;  they  are  our  fixed  modes  of  thought, 
therefore  they  are  our  beliefs ;  and  belief  is  the 
body  of  the  individual.  The  body  is  not  the 
record  of  our  beliefs ;  but  it  is  our 
beliefs ;  it  is  the  sum  total  of  all  our  beliefs ; 
for  belief  being  a  mental  thing  is  real  sub- 
stance ;  and  whether  belief  is  true  or  false,  it  is 
a  substantial  thing  so  long  as  it  lasts. 

Believing  ourselves  living  spirits  chained  to 


74  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

dead  matter  is  a  mistake  as  potent  to  hold  us 
down  to  what  we  call  the  law  of  gravitation, 
as  if  matter  really  were  a  dead  substance ;  in- 
stead of  being  what  it  really  is — pure  mind,  the 
recognition  of  the  Law  of  Being — from  which 
it  is  inseparable. 

The  inseparableness  of  substance  from  the 
Law  that  is  its  invisible  partner,  when  once 
seen  in  its  true  light,  immediately  suggests  the 
idea  of  immortality  in  the  flesh ;  especially 
when  taken  in  connection  with  the  fact  that 
man  is  self-creative. 

Indeed,  but  for  man's  belief  in  the  deadness 
of  matter,  and  his  still  more  foolish  belief  that 
God  made  him,  he  would  even  at  this  time  be 
diseaseless  and  deathless ;  he  would  even  now 
be  on  the  road  of  endless  progression,  led  ex- 
clusively by  his  desires  for  happiness.  He 
would  be  trusting  the  Law,  and  externalizing 
his  desire^which  is  the  Law  individualized  in 
him;  and  his  body  would  be  showing  forth 
greater  power  and  beauty  daily.  He  would  be 
on    that  plane    of    thought    where    his    body 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  75 

(which  is  the  condensed  form  of  his  thought) 
would  be  growing  each  day  into  a  new  and  ever 
beautifying  revision  of  his  new  and  ever  beau- 
tifying acquisition  of  intelligence. 


76  THE    BLOSSOM    OP   THE    CENTURY. 

CHAPTER  VII. 


beliefs:    BOTH    FIXED   AND    UNFIXED. 


I  now  leave  it  to  the  reader  to  say  whether 
death  is  a  necessity  of  our  organization,  or  a 
desirable  thing,  since  spirit  and  matter  are  not 
two  separate  substances. 

And  I  will  return  on  my  track  to  again  con- 
sider what  seems  to  be  the  spirit  forms  de- 
scribed so  frequently  by  Spiritualists,  and  seen 
by  thousands  of  people. 

Our  bodies  are  the  condensed  form  of  our 
thoughts,  or  our  beliefs.  Thought  and  belief 
are  in  some  degree  synonymous;  both  are 
forms  of  recognition ;  both  are  mental  expres- 
sions. A  thought  seems  not  to  have  the  fixed 
character  of  a  belief;  but  it  may  become  a 
belief;  and  in  doing  so,  it  will  take  its  place 
among  other  fixed  beliefs  and  be  a  part  of  the 
visible  body.  Belief  is  simply  thought  that 
becomes  fixed.      The    body  is   thought,  but   it 


THE    BLOSSOM   OP    THE    CENTURY.  77 

is  thought  that  is  fixed;  thought,  whose  au- 
thority is  not  questioned,  and  (on  the  men- 
tal plane,  where  we  do  really  exist,  whether 
^e  are  aware  of  it  or  not)  it  becomes  visible. 
Fixed  thought  is  belief;  and  belief  is  visible 
thought  expressed  in  a  thousand  different 
forms;  each  form  being  its  own  individual 
recognition  of  the  Law  of  Being. 

Thought — before  it  becomes  fixed  in  belief — 
is  invisible  to  our  poor,  undeveloped  percep- 
tions ;  it  is  a  reality,  though  intangible,  just  as 
the  perfume  of  flowers  and  many  other  ethe- 
real substances  which  we  are  not  able  to  per- 
ceive except  by  their  effects. 

And  yet  the  power  to  see  these  fine  sub- 
stances is  latent  among  the  undiscovered  pos- 
sibilities that  will  some  time  awaken  within 
us.  Even  now  we  get  occasional  evidences 
of  their  existence  when  we  are  off  our  guard 
against  everything  but  the  commonplace  and 
orthodox  attainments  of  the  present.  We 
sometimes  forget  that  we  believe  in  nothing 
but  what  we  call  "established  facts,"  and  in 
these  moments  of  forgetfulness,  it  may  be  that 


78      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

some  mighty  power  within  us,  and  kept  out  of 
sight  by  our  ignorant  beliefs,  will  steal  a  march 
on  us  and  show  itself  in  something  unexpected 
to,  and  even  unacceptable  by  our  "  sober 
senses." 

Then  it  is  not  impossible  that  the  thought 
which  has  so  far  mastered  us  as  to  render  us  in 
a  measure  unconscious  of  what  we  are  thinking, 
or  at  least  off  our  guard  and  unwatchful  of  the 
action  of  our  mind,  should  suddenly  appear  be- 
fore us  in  the  objective. 

It  is  a  living  thing;  each  atom  of  its  frail 
being  is  transfused  by  the  Law.  For  the  time 
being,  it  actually  has  an  individuality  of  its 
own ;  an  individuality  quite  negative,  however, 
to  that  of  its  creator,  myself,  for  instance,  and 
holding  its  objective  form  ii.  ready  obedience  to 
my  caprice. 

This  is  the  real  condition:  I  have  been  in 
a  revery,  a  careless  state  of  mind,  when  my 
thoughts  were  shaping  themselves  uncontrolled 
by  my  will.  My  will,  which  is  my  ego,  being 
off  guard,  there  is  a  tendency  to  disintegration 
in   my    body — the    sum   of  my   fixed   beliefs. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  79 

Then,  stray  thoughts,  beliefs  which  are  not 
fixed,  may  start  up  from  the  careless  or  in- 
dolent brain  and  actually  become  sufficiently 
fixed  to  be  visible.  In  becoming  thus  par- 
tially fixed  they  draw  upon  the  fixed  beliefs 
(my  body),  which  for  the  time  are  in  a  meas- 
ure unfixed. 

And  here  we  have  the  double  presence,  the 
second  party,  which  may  either  be  an  exact 
resemblance  of  ourselves  or  the  resemblance  of 
some  picture  that  exists  or  has  existed  at  some 
previous  time  in  the  mind. 

I  recall  an  occasion  when  for  a  few  hours 
I  was  so  exceedingly  negative  that  these 
thoughts  took  objective  form  by  the  hundred. 
They  were  literally  annihilating  me,  and  I  was 
too  weak  to  resist  them.  My  life  seemed  to  be 
passing  out  into  them,  when  the  physician  was 
called,  and  by  giving  me  a  stimulant  re-estab- 
lished the  ego  in  my  organization,  which  actu- 
ally appeared  to  call  into  itself  and  absorb  every 
one  of  the  wandering  shapes  that  were  using 
me  up  in  order  to  become  objective  to  me. 

That  thoughts  are  things  is  a  fact  that  can* 


80  THE   BLOSSOM    OF  THE    CENTURY. 

not  be  disputed.  We  might  as  well  say  that 
ether  did  not  exist,  because  it  is  invisible,  as  to 
say  that  thought  is  nothing  because  it  is  not 
seen  under  ordinary  conditions. 

There  is  no  nothing.  Wherever  the  Law  of 
Attraction  is  recognized  even  in  the  feeblest 
manner,  there,  though  unseen,  exists  the  form 
of  that  recognition.  Recognition  is  form.  Rec- 
ognition is  the  making  visible  of  the  Law. 
The  Law  is  the  only  thing  that  can  be  recog- 
nized. It  may  be  recognized  in  weakness  or  in 
strength ;  but  wherever  it  is  recognized,  no  mat- 
ter whether  the  recognition  is  weak  or  strong,  a 
manifestation  of  it  is  inevitable. 

Whether  this  explanation  will  apply  to  every 
phase  of  spirit  materialization  or  not,  I  cannot 
say.  Nor  have  I  given  it  in  the  hope  that  it 
will  do  so ;  for  there  is  no  pleasanter  thought  to 
me  than  that  our  loved  and  dead  do  really  live 
after  they  have  left  this  sphere,  and  can  return 
to  us  again. 

Nor  does  the  fact  that  our  thought  may  take 
shapes  which — under  certain  conditions — be- 
come objective  to  us,  invalidate  the  claim  of 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  81 

Spiritualism,  that  the  spirits  of  the  dead  can 
return  and  take  form. 

My  real  object  in  saying  what  I  have  said  is 
to  prove  to  the  reader  what  I  know  to  be 
true ;  that  there  is  no  nothing ;  and  that 
thoughts  are  things.  I  also  wish  to  establish 
the  fact  that  the  human  mind  is  an  unprospect- 
ed  field,  and  that  no  one  has  even  the  faintest 
idea  of  its  latent  powers. 

In  the  matter  of  being  lifted  from  the  floor, 
to  which  I  alluded  a  few  pages  back,  in  connec- 
tion with  other  spiritualistic  phenomena,  I 
wish  to  say  that  this  too,  may  be,  and  is  a 
power  that  belongs  to  man ;  one  that  he  can 
exercise  at  will  when  he  comes  to  know  more 
of  himself  and  his  relation  to  the  Law  of  his 
being. 


82  THE   BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

CHAPTER  VIII. 


THE    LAW    OF   ATTRACTION. 


In  attempting  to  define  the  seeming  differ- 
ence between  the  law  of  gravitation  and  the 
Law  of  Attraction,  I  showed  that  this  seeming 
difference  was  a  difference  in  the  degree  of  in- 
telligence in  the  objects  that  were  attracted.  I 
showed  how  the  words  "  death  to  death  "  would 
explain  the  law  of  gravitation,  and  "life  to 
life"  would  explain  the  Law  of  Attraction ;  in 
short,  that  the  law  of  gravitation  was  the  neg- 
ative pole  of  the  Law  of  Attraction,  since  its 
effects  were  manifested  in  objects  too  ignorant 
of  the  Law  of  Attraction  to  be  lifted  by  it. 

I  said  that  with  the  first  awakening  of  intel- 
ligence, which  in  all  objects  from  a  grain  of 
sand  up  to  man,  is  the  recognition  of  innate  de- 
sire, that  the  objects  were  lifted  upward  instead 
of  being  held  downward.  The  Law  of  Attrac- 
tion is  therefore  the  Law  of  life  in  evolution, 
while  the  law  of  gravitation  is  the  same  law  of 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  83 

life  in  latency.  All  is  life  either  in  action  or 
with  its  powers  of  action  latent. 

Therefore  the  law  of  gravitation  is  the  Law 
of  Attraction;  but  being  the  negative  pole  of 
the  Law,  seems  to  be  rather  a  denial  of  the  Law 
than  the  Law  itself. 

The  law  of  gravitation  glides  by  impercepti- 
ble degrees  into  the  Law  of  Attraction.  They 
are  the  same  Law,  the  seeming  difference  being 
the  different  degrees  of  intelligence  that  recog- 
nize it. 

The  speck  of  mold  lies  close  to  the  earth. 
It  does  not  recognize  the  principle  of  life  with- 
in it.  That  principle  of  life  is  desire.  The  Law 
in  individual  expression  is  desire ;  and  after  a 
time,  the  speck  of  mold  feels  the  monitions  of 
the  law;  recognizes  the  desire — the  law — and 
becomes  what  we  call  a  living  organism.  It  was 
alive  before,  but  did  not  know  it.  That  is,  the 
Law  of  Attraction  was  in  it  because  it  is  in  all 
things ;  but  the  recognition  was  wanting ;  or 
rather,  the  degree  of  recognition  within  it  was 
too  undeveloped  for  observation. 

So  long  as  the  recognition  was  wanting,  or 


84      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

too  feeble  for  expression,  the  speck  of  mold 
was  simply  acted  on.  With  stronger  self-recog- 
nition, came  the  power  of  independent  action ; 
and  then  it  became  obedient  to  the  Law  of 
Attraction  within  it,  as  expressed  in  its  own 
recognized  desire;  and  with  even  this  small 
amount  of  freedom  it  moved  upward  from  the 
earth.  The  law  of  gravitation  in  it  had  devel- 
oped into  the  Law  of  Attract".on.  In  strict 
truth,  it  had  always  been  the  Law  of  Attrac- 
tion, but  was  only  the  Law  of  Attraction  to 
the  intelligence  that  recognized  it  as  such. 

Thus  it  is  seen  that  a  recognition  of  the  Law 
of  Attraction  emancipates  from  a  belief  in  the 
law  of  gravitation ;  or  from  the  non-belief  in 
the  Law  of  Attraction ;  and  thus  intelligence 
becomes  master  of  death  to  the  extent  of  its 
power  to  recognize  the  Law  of  Attraction. 

I  shall  have  to  go  over  this  again  in  order  to 
make  it  clear. 

There  really  is  no  law  of  gravitation ;  that 
is,  if  I  am  permitted  to  define  the  law  of  grav- 
itation as  that  power  which  draws   all  objects 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  85 

towards  the  centre  of  the  earth.     For  there  is  * 
no  such  power. 

Every  atom  in  the  world  is  mind,  intelligence, 
recognition  of  the  Law  of  life  within  itself,  that 
when  expressed  at  all,  is  expressed  in  desire. 
This  Life  Principle  which  is  expressed  in  the 
individual  as  desire,  exists  in  latency  in  every 
atom;  and  it  is  no  sooner  recognized  by  the 
atom  than  the  atom  acts  in  obedience  to  it. 
The  desire  in  the  atom  always  leads  away  from 
the  earth,  and  not  down  into  it,  showing  that 
the  real  attraction  to  which  every  desire  points 
is  upward  and  not  downward. 

The  tree  is  attracted  upward,  and  it  goes  on 
being  attracted  upward  in  obedience  to  its  de- 
sire until  its  very  roots — in  a  broad  sense — 
are  freed  from  the  earth,  and  it  walks  on  top  of 
the  earth  in  a  form  of  greater  freedom.  It  may 
have  a  multitude  of  feet  on  the  ground  and  may 
move  with  difficulty,  but  the  same  Law  of  At- 
traction keeps  growing  upon  its  recognition, 
until  in  the  lapse  of  ages  it  stands  upon  four 
feet.    And  so  the  power  of  recognition  goes  on 


86  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

for  ages  again ;  and  it  has  so  far  emancipated 
itself  that  it  stands  on  only  two  feet. 

And  still  the  power  to  recognize  the  Law  as 
expressed  in  desire  goes  on ;  and  the  freedom 
from  the  so-called  law  of  gravitation  con- 
tinues. 

This  is  the  case  to-day.  It  has  been  the  case 
always ;  and  who  is  there  to  limit  its  progress 
in  the  future? 

Man,  as  to  his  personality,  is  clear  mind  or 
intelligence.  He  is  the  Law  in  the  objective. 
The  Law  as  personified  in  desire  is  his  sub- 
jective side;  and  the  seeming  two  are  one. 

The  Law  is  inexhaustible.  Man's  recognition 
of  the  law  has  its  limitations,  and  these  limita- 
tions establish  his  shape,  and  the  shape  of 
every  object  in  nature. 

But  though  we  see  in  man's  present  shape, 
and  in  the  power  or  lack  of  power  he  manifests, 
the  limitation  of  his  intelligence,  yet  there  is 
no  valid  reason  why  there  should  ever  be  a  lim- 
it to  his  intelligence,  or  his  recognition  of  the 
Law.  The  Law  being  limitless,  his  power  to 
recognize  it  is  also  limitless.    And  as  every  fresh 


THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY.       87 

recognition  of  its  power  releases  him  more  and 
more  from  the  deadness  called  gravitation,  and 
puts  him  more  and  more  under  the  influence  of 
the  Law  of  Attraction,  which  is  not  towards  the 
earth,  but  away  from  it,  I  say  the  time  is  com- 
ing when  he  shall  float  in  the  air ;  and  that  too 
without  any  foreign  appliances,  and  without 
any  effort  beyond  the  simple  recognition  of  the 
Law  of  Attraction.  In  other  words,  he  will  float 
in  the  air  because  he  wants  to. 

It  is  impossible  to  form  anything  like  an  ad- 
equate idea  of  the  power  of  the  Law  of  Attrac- 
tion. Every  form  of  organization  depends  upon 
it.  Every  organized  form,  according  to  its 
needs,  recognizes  the  power  of  the  Law,  and 
becomes  just  what  it  recognizes ;  or  shows  forth 
in  its  external  self  that  which  it  perceives  to  be 
good. 

Recognition  is  the  externalizing  power ;  and 
it  is  something  that  grows.  The  Law  does  not 
grow ;  but  the  recognition  of  the  power  of  the 
Law  grows  constantly  in  the  mind  of  the  un- 
trammelled thinker ;  and  this  is  why  life  is  a 
progression  and  not  a  creation. 


88       THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

Nothing  is  created;  nothing  ever  has  been 
created.  What  we  call  creation  is  the  thousand 
forms  of  recognition  of  the  power  of  the  Law 
of  Attraction. 

If  recognition  may  be  called  creation,  and  in 
one  sense  it  may  be  so  called,  then  forms  are 
self-created. 

They  are  at  least  self-manifested. 

It  is  a  half  intuitive  perception  of  this  fact 
that  has  started  the  belief  called  "  free  moral 
agency," 

If  free  moral  agency  means  the  power  to  act 
independent  of  the  Law,  then  there  is  no  free 
moral  agency;  for  the  Law  is  one  with  the 
power  that  exerts  it ;  and  the  nearest  approach 
a  man  can  make  to  freedom  is  through  greater 
knowledge  of  the  Law,  or  closer  conformity 
with  it. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF'    THE    CENTURY.  89 

CHAPTER  IX. 


THE  EGO. 


"Out  of  the  night  that  shelters  me, 
Black  as  the  pit  from  pole  to  pole, 

I  thank  whatever  gods  there  be 
For  my  unconquerable  soul." 

The  much  repetition  of  the  foregoing  pages 
would  be  unpardonable  but  for  the  fact  that 
nothing  short  of  repetition  over  and  over  again 
would  make  the  subject  clear  to  those  to  whom 
the  idea  is  new. 

There  are  two  parts  to  this  subject.  On 3  re- 
lates to  the  Law  of  Being  or  Attraction.  The 
other  relates  to  individual  life  under  the 
Law. 

We  know  nothing  of  the  Law  except  that  it 
is  the  Life  Principle ;  that  it  fills  all  space  ab- 
solutely full,  leaving  no  room  for  the  least 
particle  of  death.  We  know  that  this  Life 
Principle  is  altogether  good,  and  as  it  fills 
the  universe ,  therefore  the  universe  is  alto- 
gether   good.      This     statement    excludes    the 


90      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

idea  of  either  death  or  evil.  And  indeed,  there 
is  no  death  and  no  evil. 

The  Life  Principle,  the  Law,  is  the  continent 
of  all  possibilities.  Man  and  all  creatures  ex- 
ternalize in  their  own  personalities  these  possi- 
bilities as  rapidly  as  they  recognize  them. 

Recognition  makes  apparent  or  visible  those 
possibilities  of  the  Law  that  were  unapparent 
or  invisible  before  they  were  recognized.  In 
this  sense — the  sense  of  externalizing  or 
making  visible  the  possibilities  of  the  Law — the 
power  to  recognize  may  be  called  the  creative 
power ;  and  from  this  time  on,  I  shall  speak  of 
it  as  creative. 

Recognition  then,  which  is  intelligence  or 
mind,  creates. 

I  therefore  come  to  the  second  of  the  two 
parts  of  this  subject;  that  which  relates  to 
creation. 

The  old  question  in  the  catechism,  "Who 
made  you?"  has  never  been  answered  correctly 
except  in  one  instance ;  at  least,  there  is  only 
one  instance  on  record,  and  that  will  be  found 
in  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin." 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  91 

When  Miss  Ophelia  propounded  the  question 
to  Topsy,  it  was  answered  correctly :  "Nobody 
made  me.      I  just  growed." 

On  the  hypothesis  that  there  is  a  personal 
God,  who  in  spite  of  his  personality — which 
means  his  limitation — still  fills  all  space ;  and 
on  the  still  farther  hypothesis  that  he  made 
man  and  all  the  other  creatures,  I  think  it 
must  be  admitted  that,  for  an  individual  of  his 
power  and  unerring  judgment,  he  made  a 
very  poor  job  of  it;  so  poor  that  it  is  no  won- 
der he  got  tired  of  the  work  of  his  hands 
and  gave  us  over  to  his  coadjutor,  the  devil,  to 
hide  it  out  of  his  sight. 

Compare  this  theory  with  the  theory  that 
the  race  is  a  growth,  and  that  it  takes  no  step 
forward  in  the  scale  of  being  except  by  recog- 
nition of  more  truth,  or  the  gain  of  more  in- 
telligence ;  and  compare  it  as  it  now  stands 
with  what  it  was  at  the  time  of  the  cave-dwel- 
lers, and  see  if  it,  as  its  own  creator,  has  not 
the  right  to  be  proud  of  its  work. 

On  the  first  hypothesis  the  work  was  finished 
at  one  blow — as  it  were — and  it  was  a  wretched 


92  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY, 

piece  of  work.  On  the  second  hypothesis  we 
see  the  never-ceasing  effort  of  intellect  to  climb 
higher  in  the  intellectual  scale ;  and  as  a  re- 
sult, an  unfinishedjbut  a  constantly  progressing 
race;  a  race  that  we  admire  and  respect  be_ 
cause  we  know  that  it  is  where  it  is  by  its  own 
effort;  by  its  own  unceasing  struggle  with  ig- 
norance ;  by  the  daily  heroism  of  its  past  as  it 
journeyed  through  untrodden  wildernesses  of 
thought  without  a  solitary  guiding  light  except 
that  which  its  slowly  growing  experience 
yielded  it. 

Take  this  glorious  race  just  as  it  stands  to- 
day, still  fettered  and  still  clinging  to  its 
chains,  but  still  advancing  slowly  along  the 
road  that  promises  relief  from  them,  and  com- 
pare it  with  the  cut  and  dried  and  finished  race 
that  God  made,  and  note  the  difference  in  your 
feelings  for  the  two. 

In  God's  race  there  is  no  hope.  It  was  com- 
pleted at  its  birth  and  has  done  nothing  but 
degenerate  ever  since.  God  made  it  dependent 
on  himself;  and  it  now  finds  itself  in  the 
dilemma  of  an  abandoned  job ;  God  having  in  a 


THE  BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  93 

Jieasure  washed  his  hands  of  it,  and  left  it  to 
the  tender  mercies  of  its  arch-enemy,  whom 
God  also  made,  apparently  for  no  other 
purpose  than  that  of  a  scape-goat  for  his  own 
mistakes. 

But  the  man-made  race  of  evolution  began 
in  the  smallest  possible  way.  It  was  not  only 
not  perfect  at  its  inception,  but  it  was  merely 
the  seed  germ  of  a  race.  It  had  no  God  to 
depend  upon,  and  no  inspired  guide  to  lead  it. 
It  was  self-creative  and  self-dependent  from 
the  first,  and  it  felt  its  slow  but  sure  way  up 
from,  its  beginning,  through  the  darkness  of 
absolute  ignorance.  It  had  no  guides  but  its 
mistakes.  These  mistakes  which  have  been 
imputed  to  it  as  sins  have  been  its  only  guide- 
posts  to  point  it  in  the  right  direction.  And 
yet  it  has  forged  its  way  through  earth  and  air 
and  fire  and  water  and  tempest,  and  the  dense 
blackness  of  ifes  own  intellectual  night,  to  its 
present  standpoint,  where  it  sees  the  dawning 
of  light  at  last.  It  has  scored  its  triumphs  in 
the  conquest  of  a  myriad  of  obstacles ;  it  has 
covered   itself  with   bruises   and   wounds    too 


94  THE   BLOSSOM   OF    THE    CENTURY. 

grievous  to  tell  of ;  it  has  left  thousands  of  its 
numbers  to  mark  each  upward  step  in  its  prog- 
ress ;  and  it  is  here  to-day,  blood-stained,  sick 
and  sore  from  its  head  to  its  feet,  but  daunt- 
less still,  and  covered  with  the  glory  of  its  un- 
dying courage. 

0,  beautiful  Race!  A  baby  race  even  yet; 
still  foot  bound  in  the  long  gowns  of  its  infan- 
cy, but  ready  now  to  tear  away  each  hamper- 
ing bond,  and  walk  forth  in  the  broad  road  of 
an  infinite  freedom  towards  infinite  wisdom. 

Which  will  you  have ;  the  race  that  God 
made  or  the  race  that  is  now  making  itself? 

Those  who  look  upon  the  race  to  condemn  it, 
exhibit  about  as  much  judgment  as  one,  who 
coming  into  the  orange  grove  at  my  window, 
should  taste  the  unripe  fruit  and  pronounce 
the  entire  orange  culture  a  failure. 

If  God  made  the  race,  then  there  would  be  no 
need  for  any  action  upon  its  part  at  all.  It  is 
made  and  finished  and  that  is  all  there  is  of  it 
But  if  the  race  made  itself,  which  it  surely  did, 
then  it  has  an  endless  work  before  it  in  making 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CP^NTURY.  95 

itself  over  in  accordance  with  its  over-enlarg- 
ing and  ever-beautifying  ideal. 

And  who  will  deny  the  presence  of  the  ideal 
in  man?  Man,  God-made,  could  have  no  use 
for  an  ideal,  since  God's  work  must  necessa- 
rily be  perfect ;  it  might  have  the  power  to 
retrograde,  but  it  evidently  could  have  no  pow- 
er to  progress. 

And  yet  we  find  in  man  an  ideal  that  is 
always  far  ahead  of  his  present  attainment. 
This  would  not  be  in  him  if  God  had  made 
him ;  it  would  be  in  him  if  he  had  made  him- 
self ;  it  would  be  the  beautiful  implanted  hope 
ever  leading  him  to  higher  growth ,  to  nobler 
attainment. 

And  this  ideal  is  not  only  in  man,  but  it  ex- 
ists in  every  organized  creature  from  the  low- 
est form  of  life  on  up  through  the  scale  to 
man.  It  is  the  aspiration,  the  desire,  the  Law 
incarnate  whose  never  ending  possibilities  are 
foreshadowed  in  the  creature's  intuitive  or 
latent  powers  of  recognition.  It  is  the  very 
basis  of  growth  in  all  creatures,  and  links  all 
creatures  together  on  the  road  of  infinite   pro- 


96  THE    BLOSSOM   OK    THE    CENTURY. 

gression ;  proving  not  only  the  oneness  of  the 
Law,  but  the  oneness  of  the  Law's  recognition 
of  itself.  For  the  Law's  recognition  of  itself  is 
one,  though  expressed  in  individuals.  It  is 
one  unbroken  chain  of  recognition  that  estab- 
lishes not  only  the  brotherhood  of  man  with 
man,  but  the  brotherhood  of  every  expression 
of  life  with  every  other  expression.  For  as  the 
Law  is  one,  so  the  recognition  of  the  Law  is 
one;  thus  demonstrating  the  wholeness  and 
infallibility  of  the  Universe. 

Every  life  cell  is  an  ego.  It  is  a  seed  germ. 
When — under  the  Law  of  Attraction — two  or 
more  of  the  life  cells  unite,  they  come  into  one 
understanding  of  the  Law,  not  into  two  or  three 
understandings,  and  the  two  or  three  egos 
become  one  ego  and  possess  greater  drawing 
power  than  the  single  life  cell. 

This  is  shown  in  the  common  magnet.  It 
has  its  positive  and  negative  pole  and  demon- 
strates its  power  as  .a  whole  magnet.  It  may 
be  broken  into  a  hundred  pieces,  and  each 
piece  will  be  a  perfect  magnet  with  its  positive 
and  negative  pole.     Weld  the  pieces  together 


THE   BI/JSSOM    OF   THE3    CENTURY.  97 

again  and  the  many  magnets  become  one  mag- 
net. The  magnetism  is  indivisible ;  the  recog- 
nition of  the  magnetism  may  be  individualized  ; 
and  it  is  individualized  endlessly  in  the  pri- 
mordial life  cells.  The  drawing  together  of  the 
cells  and  their  cohesion  in  more  complex 
forms  is  individual  growth. 

In  individual  growth  the  drawing  power  of 
the  individual  is  constantly  increased;  as  it 
increases,  it  becomes  constantly  more  positive 
to  the  less  complex  individualities  about  it, 
and  masters  them ;  by  mastering  them  it  unites 
their  power  to  its  own.  The  strength  of  the 
conquered  does,  in  a  sense,  pass  into  the  con- 
queror ;  and  so  we  have  the  law  of  individual 
growth,  which  is  by  the  survival  of  the 
fittest. 

The  magnet's  recognition  of  its  own  magnet- 
ism is  it  recognition  of  the  Law  of  Attraction 
within  it. 

The  man's  recognition  of  desire  within  him- 
self is  the  recognition  of  the  Law  of  Attraction 
within  him. 

The  leading  difference   between   the   magnet 


98      THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

and  the  man  is  that,  while  both  recognize  the 
Law  of  Attraction  within  themselves,  the 
man's  recognition  is  of  such  a  character  as  to 
give  birth  to  will;  the  conscious  ego;  while 
that  of  the  magnet  has  not  advanced  so  far  on 
the  road  to  conciousness. 

In  the  early  stages  of  individual  growth,  the 
creature's  recognition  of  the  Law  of  Attraction 
within  it  is  perceived  to  be  simple  desire.  But 
this  desire  is  the  basis  of  all  future  growth. 
The  more  we  gratify  desire,  the  more  it  grows. 
This  is  equivalent  to  saying,  the  more  we  recog- 
nize the  Law,  the  more  of  the  power  we  em- 
body; for  the  gratification  of  desire  is  the  rec- 
ognition of  the  Law. 

The  desire  thus  recognized  by  the  creature 
has  no  moral  character  whatever ;  nor  has  the 
Law  itself  any  moral  character.  Morality  is 
an  external  thing,  and  belongs  to  the  intelli- 
gence. 

Desire  is  a  purely  selfish  attribute. 

What  then,  is  the  Law  of  Attraction,  the  Law 
that  men  call  God's,  a  selfish  principle? 

The   Law   of   Attraction   has    no    character 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CEKTUEY.  99 

whatever;  it  is  neither  selfish  nor  unselfish;  .c 
is  simply  the  drawing  power,  whole  and  in- 
divisible ;  utterly  regardless  of  morality  or 
individual  rights. 

With  individualization,  comes  the  conscious- 
ness of  the  Law,  taking  the  form  of  desire. 
It  is  utterly  selfish ;  it  is  the  ego ;  it  is  the  "I" 
in  a  struggle  with  every  other  "I." 

Its  selfishness,  from  its  first  inception,  is  only 
limited  by  its  lack  of  power.  It  is  its  own 
centre  of  the  universe,  and  its  one  effort  is  to 
draw  to  itself  all  there  is. 

The  selfishness  of  the  creature  increases  step 
by  step  with  the  development  of  higher  and 
still  higher  types  of  life.  Why?  Because  de- 
velopment is  nothing  else  but  the  still  greater 
recognition  of  individual  desire ;  and  desire  is 
the  starting  point  and  the  basic  principle  of 
self;  it  is  selfishness  or  selfhood. 

The  desire  of  the  individual  is  only  limited 
in  its  selfish  grasping  after  everything  it  sees, 
by  a  still  greater  desire ;  the  desire  for  a  secure 
life. 

So   long   as    all   creatures    act  from   selfish 


100  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

desire  there  is  one  constant  state  of  warfare, 
and  the  world  is  under  the  dominion  of  fear. 
The  desire  for  peace  and  security  dominates  the 
desire  for  possession,  and  gradually  it  becomes 
the  highest  desire  that  justice  shall  reign,  be- 
cause justice  giiarantees  the  greatest  happiness. 
Tiie  desire,  without  ever  forsaking  the  central 
standpoint  of  self,  always  bent  on  its  own  hap- 
piness, has  developed  a  better  conception  or  a 
better  recognition  of  what  it  takes  to  produce 
happiness. 

Individual  life  rests  exclusively  on  selfish- 
ness ;  the  effort  of  each  to  attain  its  own  ends ; 
its  own  happiness.  The  best  method  of  attain- 
ing these  ends,  true  happiness,  is  a  matter  of 
intellectual  growth ;  a  matter  of  greater  recog- 
nition of  the  Law  of  Attraction ;  the  law  of  in- 
finite union ;  the  Law  as  expressed  in  greater 
and  more  complex  desires. 

The  renunciation  of  one  individual  to  another 
and  the  folly  of  self-sacrifice  become  apparent 
when  it  is  seen  that  such  renunciation  and  sac- 
rifice rest  on  the  same  foundation  that  all  our 
other  actions  rest  upon.     They    are    performed 


THE   BLOSSOM   OP   THE    CENTURY.  101 

for  the  purpose  of  yielding  us  the  greatest  happi- 
ness either  here  or  hereafter. 

So  it  happens  that  no  man  can  resign  the 
ego.  Let  him  cover  it  up  as  he  will,  it  is 
always  the  motor  that  moves  him,  and  always 
will  be.  What  is  religion  but  giving  up  some- 
thing in  the  present  in  order  that  we  may  get 
it  in  the  future  with  infinitely  compounded  in- 
terest? I  am  willing  to  give  the  heathen  the 
twenty  dollars  I  have  saved  for  the  purchase  of 
a  new  dress,  if  I  am  convinced  that  God  is  my 
security  and  will  pay  me  back  a  hundred-fold. 
It  appears  to  me  as  a  first  class  business  trans- 
action and  I  will  risk  "  the  sacrifice," 

The  mother  love,  that  beautiful  and  tender 
and  holy  feeling,  is  self-love.  The  child  is  the 
object  of  the  mother's  desire ;  probably  the  very 
highest  object  of  her  desire,  and  she  holds  it 
more  tenaciously  than  anything  else. 

Every  form  of  love  rests  on  desire ;  rests  on 
the  basis  of  self.  Indeed,  every  good  and  beau- 
tiful attribute  has  self-love  for  its  starting 
point ;  self-love  worked  out  through  higher  and 
nobler  recognition    of  the  Law  of  Attraction, 


102  THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CEKTURY, 

and  individualized  in  higher  and  nobler  de- 
sires. 

The  growth  of  desire  is  the  growth  and 
strengthening  of  the  individual. 

Society,  when  it  shall  have  reached  a  more 
ideal  condition  than  at  present,  will  have 
reached  it  through  the  strengthening  of  the 
individualities  composing  it;  and  these  indi- 
vidualities will  have  become  strengthened  by  a 
better  recognition  of  their  own  selfhood  as  ex- 
pressed in  their  enlarged  desire. 

The  total  sacrifice  of  the  selfish  principle  as 
expressed  in  desire,  if  such  a  thing  were  possi- 
ble, would  mean  the  destruction  of  the  ego, 
which  would  be  annihilation.  And  this  is  the 
impracticable  and  the  impossible  religion 
preached  from  thousands  of  pulpits  to-day, 
whose  effects  are  not  the  making  of  men,  but 
the  prostitution  of  them  to  a  mistaken  renun- 
ciation and  a  self-deceptive  and  often  a  hyp- 
ocritical humility. 

Religion  is  based  on  fear.  And  I  now  state 
boldly  that  everything  in  this  world  that  is 
based  on  fear  must  die.     It  must  die  that  man 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  103 

may  live  and  love  and  expand  to  the  glory  of 
true  and  free  individualism  through  the  power 
of  love,  whose  very  nature  is  incompatible  with 
fear. 

The  love  that  is  preached  from  the  pulpit  is 
an  impossible  thing  in  the  character  of  the 
religion  that  preaches  it.     And  why? 

Because  the  religion  itself  is  the  most  diluted 
compound  of  weakness  ever  concocted  for  the 
abject  prostration  of  individuality.  It  is  a 
doctrine  that  teaches  men  to  resign  their  own 
strength,  and  to  lean  on  the  strength  of  anoth- 
er ;  a  doctrine  that  ignores  individual  power, 
and  throws  itself  in  abject  helplessness  upon 
some  imaginary  power  external  to  the  individ- 
ual. Under  such  circumstances  the  very  effort 
of  a  person  to  love  his  neighbor  as  himself  be- 
comes a  hypocritical  pretense ;  he  is  not  capa- 
ble of  generating  love;  love  is  the  child  of  free- 
dom, and  the  slave  of  fear  is  powerless  to  beget 
it;  no  one  who  is  weak  in  his  own  selfhood 
can  give  himself ;  and  this  is  love.  No  one 
who  leans  on  a  power  outside  of  himself  can  be 
anything  but  weak. 


104     THE  BLOSSOM  OP  THE  CENTURY. 

It  is  only  when  men  come  into  a  state  of 
freedom  from  the  ripening  of  the  ego,  that  it 
becomes  possible  for  them  to  fulfill  the  claims 
of  the  so-called  gospel,  and  love  others  as  they 
love  themselves.  For  love  is  the  overplus  oj 
strength^  and  they  who  lean  and  beg  will  never 
be  strong  enough  to  generate  anything  but  a 
counterfeit  representative  of  it. 

Love  is  the  outflow  of  individual  strength ; 
the  outflow  of  the  individual's  very  self ;  there 
is  no  outflow  to  individual  weakness ;  nothing 
but  the  absorptive  drying  up  that  we  perceive 
in  stagnant  water. 

The  time  is  fast  approaching  when  men  will 
love ;  and  that  too,  because  self  is  the  moving 
spring  of  each  person.  When  we  shall  become 
free  from  fear  through  the  growing  knowledge 
of  our  own  power,  we  will  see  in  others 
only  the  qualities  that  attract  us,  and  we  will 
flow  out  to  them  in  desires  for  their  good ;  beau- 
tiful deeds  will  become  the  spontaneous  out- 
growth of  free  souls.  In  an  atmosphere  of 
freedom,  the  kingdom  of  love  will  be  estab- 
lished. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  105 

We  would  love  now  if  we  were  free  and 
strong ;  but  we  are  so  fettered  and  so  weak,  and 
so  full  of  fears  for  our  own  safety  that  we  can- 
not get  away  from  the  clamoring  ego  within 
us  for  an  hour.  We  cannot  come  into  that 
condition  of  noble  and  lofty  repose  which 
enables  us  to  say,  "All  things  are  well  at  home ; 
I  will  therefore  go  abroad  and  see  if  I  cannot 
make  them  better  for  my  neighbors."  This 
would  be  love.  It  would  be  the  superabundant 
outflow  of  strength. 

But  why  should  I  care — being  happy  myself 
— whether  others  are  happy  or  not?  Am  I  not 
under  obedience  to  the  law  of  selfishness?  In 
what  particular  is  this  personal  ego  I  find 
within  myself  to  be  served  by  serving  others? 

I  answer  that  in  my  still  farther  recognition 
of  the  Law  of  Attraction  I  have  come  into  clos- 
er relationship  with  my  neighbor ;  the  drawing 
power  of  the  Law  has  so  shown  me  his  oneness 
with  me  that  it  has  become  my  desire  to  help 
him ;  my  whole  nature  has  warmed  towards 
him,  because  the  law  in  its  fuller  manifestation 
is  Love.     My  more  complete  recognition  of  the 


106     THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY 

Law  has  filled  me  with  love,  and  love  seeks  an 
object;  it  is  the  expression  of  the  Law  of  At- 
traction, and  being  full  of  it,  my  happiness  is 
best  served  by  manifesting  it  in  noble  words 
and  generous  deeds.  And  thus,  even  in  the  ex- 
ecution of  man's  loftiest  ideal  for  the  univer- 
sal good,  we  see  that  he  acts  in  obedience  to  his 
self-love ;  the  love  so  misunderstood  and  so 
condemned  by  the  superficial  thought  of  the 
age. 

The  tendency  of  evolution  is  the  perfecting 
of  individuality ;  the  concentration  of  power  in 
the  ego.  Man  must  learn  that  he  is  self- 
creative,  and  this,  his  only  hope,  lies  in  this 
fact;  that  his  only  salvation  is  knowledge; 
that  knowledge  is  a  constantly  growing  power. 

Seeing  this  to  be  so,  let  every  human  being 
take  fresh  hope. 

So  long  as  salvation  is  supposed  to  depend 
on  another,  it  must  always  seem  doubtful ;  and 
this  doubt  cannot  but  keep  one  more  or  less 
under  the  influence  of  fear. 

But  when  self  salvation  is  seen  to  rest  on  self 
dependence,    on  indi^ndual    effort,  then  native 


THE    BLOSSOM    OP   THE    CENTURY.  107 

courage  and  will  power  come  to  the  rescue,  and 
a  man  shoulders  the  burden  of  his  journey  and 
trudges  along  the  road  of  endless  progression 
with  faith  in  himself  to  overcome  all  obstacles. 
And  in  this  frame  of  mind  he  grows  stronger 
every  hour,  no  matter  how  rough  the  journey; 
the  rougher  the  better,  since  every  conquest 
adds  to  his  strength  until  he  feels  his  position 
to  be  God-like  and  irresistible. 


108     THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

CHAPTER  X. 


ENDLESS  PROGRESSION.   ITS  RETARDATION  BY 
FEAR. 


Self-dependence  in  the  pursuit  of  wisdom ; 
this  alone  is  growth. 

Whenever  a  man  is  in  a  position  that  entails 
the  necessity  of  leaning  on  some  external  aid, 
he  is  a  dying  man ;  his  tendency  is  downward ; 
he  is  under  the  so-called  law  of  gravitation. 
Knock  the  props  from  under  him ;  then,  if  he 
can  stand  alone  with  faith  in  his  own  unaided 
self,  and  with  the  resolution  to  follow  his  high- 
est aspirations,  indifferent  to  the  criticisms  of 
his  neighbors,  he  has  passed  the  line  that  lies 
between  the  so-called  law  of  gravitation  and 
the  Law  of  Attraction,  and  has  entered  the 
outskirts  of  a  diseaseless  and  deathless  domain 
of  pure  life. 

That  this  is  a  difficult  thing  to  do  no  one 
can  doubt.      We  look  abroad  and  see    disease 


THE    BLOSSOM    OP    THE    CENTURY.  109 

and  death  everywhere.  They  seem  to  be  the 
established  order  of  nature ;  to  break  away 
from  them  looks  like  an  impossibility.  We 
have  not  yet  discovered  that  there  is  no  estab- 
lished order  in  nature ;  we  cannot  yet  realize 
that  nature  is  an  ever-varying  series  of  concep- 
tions of  the  Law,  and  that  disease  and  death 
are  among  these  conceptions. 

That  they  are  mistaken  conceptions,  or  con- 
ceptions based  on  our  ignorance  of  absolute 
truth  has  not  occurred  to  us.  We  have  not  yet 
found  out  that  all  is  life,  and  that  the  whole 
chain  of  growth  from  the  lowest  organic  form, 
up  to  man,  is  a  gradually  growing  consciousness 
of  this  great  truth ;  this  absolute  truth ;  the 
only  absolute  truth  we  know  at  this  time. 

The  entire  procession  of  organic  forms — 
I  say  again,  has  been  but  a  series  of  gradu- 
ally enlarging  perceptions  of  the  one  absolute 
truth  that  there  is  no  death,  and  can  be  none ; 
that  all  is  life. 

Individual  intelligence,  individual  know- 
ledge of  this  one  mighty  truth  is  positive  sal- 
vation from  disease  and  death. 


110     THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

That  disease  and  death  should  be  among  the 
conceptions  of  nature  is  because  nature  in  her 
conceptions  of  the  truth  is  a  growth.  She  can- 
not conceive  the  full  possibilities  of  the  Law 
of  Attraction  in  a  moment,  any  more  than  a 
peach  can  conceive  the  possibilities  of  its  fully 
ripened  condition  at  the  moment  of  its  in- 
ception. 

Let  us  imagine  that  nature  could  be  abso- 
lutely perfect  and  beyond  the  possibility  of 
any  farther  growth ;  that  man,  as  a  part  of 
nature,  was  also  perfect.  In  this  case,  he 
would  have  nothing  more  to  desire,  and  no 
farther  incentive  either  to  thought  or  action. 
Is  there  anything  desirable  in  such  a  condi- 
tion? Is  it  not  the  most  terrible  form  of  death 
that  one  can  imagine?  Dead  and  yet  conscious 
of  the  situation ;  dead  and  yet  sufficiently  alive 
to  know  it.  For  my  part,  I  should  prefer  an 
eternal  sleep. 

On  the  other  hand,  look  at  nature  with  man 
at  its  head  as  an  ever-growing  thing.  Look  at 
the  Law  as  expressed  individually  in  desire. 
In  this   condition,  there   is   always   a   future ; 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  Ill 

there  is  always  some  happiness  to  be  attained, 
which  when  attained,  projects  its  hope  of  some 
other  and  greater  happiness.  There  is  always 
some  obstacle  of  ignorance  to  be  conquered, 
the  conquering  of  which  brings  a  greater  con- 
sciousness of  strength  and  power  to  him  who 
conquers.  There  is  an  ever  enlarging  object  in 
life ;  an  ever  enlarging  hope  for  that  which  lies 
beyond ;  an  ever  enlarging  future,  which  in 
passing  behind  us,  strengthens  our  position  in 
the  universe  and  confirms  our  mastery  more 
and  more.  There  is  always  something  to  live 
for ;  always  an  object  to  stimulate  effort,  and 
always  the  deepening  and  broadening  and 
beautifying  manhood  and  womanhood  that  is 
the  result  of  effort.  There  is  always  the  closer 
approximation  of  our  external  selves  to  the 
glorious  intern *«1  ideal  born  of  desire,  and 
bringing  us  more  and  more  into  a  position  of 
oneness  with  the  Law  of  Attraction,  thus 
uniting  us  in  love  and  harmony  and  power. 

And  in  all  of  this  growth,  we  will  eventually 
exhaust  the  latent  possibilities  of  the  earth,  and 
enter    other    spheres    of  thought   and    action, 


112  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

whose  possibilities  will  far  transcend   those  of 
the  earth. 

And  on,  and  on,  through  a  never-ending  series 
of  conquests  in  obedience  to  the  ideal,  which 
allures  forever  to  higher  heights  and  to  hap- 
pier happiness,  and  to  tenderer  and  nobler 
love. 

There  is  perfection,  but  man  will  never 
reach  it.  It  is  an  infinite  thing  and  belongs 
only  to  the  Law,  the  unchangeable  Principle  of 
Life ;  the  Eternal  Unit ;  the  One.  Man  is 
many;  he  represents  a  million  phases  of  the 
Law,  but  not  the  All  of  it.  His  happiness  de- 
pends on  his  finitehood;  on  the  absolutely 
limitless  capacity  of  his  power  to  grow. 

The  basis  of  individual  life  is  desire.  Desire 
is  the  Law  incarnate  in  the  individual.  It  is 
the  diseaseless  and  deathless  principle.  This 
fact  shows  that  it  is  of  the  Law,  and  not  of 
the  intelligence,  or  the  recognition  of  the 
Law. 

The  desire  exists  whether  it  is  recognized 
or  not.  Indeed,  it  is  very  seldom  that  the 
desire  is  recognized  in  a  man  in   a  way  that 


THE    BLOSSOi..    OF    THE    CENTURY.  113 

will  make  it  apparent  in  his  consolidated  in- 
telligence, which  is  his  body. 

He  desires  and  he  recognizes  that  he  does 
desire,  but  he  does  not  recognize  that  his  desire 
is  a  power  to  be  relied  upon.  He  desires,  but 
he  fears  to  trust  his  desire  and  trusts  his  fear 
instead ;  thus  giving  the  superior  recognition 
to  his  fear  and  ignoring  his  desire.  In  ignor- 
ing his  desire,  he  in  a  measure  paralyzes  its 
effectiveness ;  in  recognizing  his  fear,  he  makes 
the  fear  paramount  in  his  mind  or  his  intel- 
ligence, and  it  is  the  fear  that  is  recorded  in 
his  intelligence,  and  not  the  perfect  desire. 
And  this  is  why  these  human  intelligences — 
our  bodies — are  so  weak  and  wretched  and 
diseased,  and  why  they  die. 

To  fear  is  as  much  a  function  of  the  intellect 
as  to  hope.  To  fear  is  to  believe  something 
that  you  do  not  wish  to  believe.  Every  be- 
lief is  a  form  of  intelligence  or  ignorance;  (the 
two  words  are  off  the  same  piece,  being  nega- 
tive and  positive  poles  of  truth.)  To  believe 
what  you  fear,  is  to  make  manifest  a  certain  be- 
lief ;  it  is  a  negative  belief,  but  it  is  a  belief ; 


114  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

and  to  believe  anything  whatever,  is  to  make  it 
manifest  or  visible ;  whether  it  is  a  negative  be- 
lief, by  which  I  mean  a  belief  that  denies  the 
absolute  truth  that  all  is  life,  or  a  positive  be- 
lief that  afl&rms  the  infallibility  of  the  Life 
Principle. 

If  a  man  believes  that  which  he  fears,  his 
belief  is  a  traitor  to  his  desire;  it  is  not  at 
one  with  his  desire,  and  therefore,  it  does  not 
properly  clothe  his  desire  or  make  it  mani- 
fest. 

There  is  no  belief  entirely  free  from  the 
recognition  of  the  desire ;  there  must  be  some 
recognition  of  desire  in  every  belief,  or  else  the 
body  of  man's  belief  would  scarcely  cohere 
enough  to  give  him  a  personal  appearance  at 
all.  And  men  do  trust  their  desires  deep 
down  in  their  intuitional  natures  much  more 
than  they  are  usually  aware  of;  from  this  fact, 
they  live  longer  than  would  appear  possi- 
ble when  we  consider  how  very  much  people 
seem  to  trust  their  fears.  Desire  is  so  positive 
a  thing  that  it  commands  a  certain   amount  of 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  115 

recognition,  even  though  it  is  unconscious  or 
intuitive  recognition. 

Life,  freedom  from  disease  and  old  age,  de- 
pend entirely  on  the  amount  and  kind  of 
recognition  a  man  gives  to  his  desire.  One 
man  recognizes  his  desire  as  something  danger- 
ous to  his  own  salvation  and  to  society,  and 
goes  to  work  to  crush  it.  This  crushing  pro- 
cess usually  strengthens  the  desire  and  thereby 
the  individual ;  but  it  is  apt  to  render  him  an 
inharmonious  element  in  society,  not  because 
his  desire  is  evil,  but  because  his  mistaken  in- 
telligence imputes  evil  to  it.  With  this  im- 
puted character,  and  with  the  recognition  he 
has  given  his  desire  in  trying  to  crush  it,  he 
has  become  a  strong  man  in  a  mistaken  direc- 
tion. 

For  the  desire  is  the  Principle  of  Life  in  the 
man.  It  points  forever  in  the  direction  of 
happiness ;  it  is  altogether  good  and  disease- 
less  and  deathless,  without  knowing  this  fact. 
It  is  a  part  of  the  altogether  good  and  disease- 
less  and  deathless  Law,  awaiting  individual 
recognition    in   order   to   become    manifest    or 


116  THE    BLOSSOM   OF   THE    CENTURY. 

visible  on  the  external  (the  mental)  plane,  in 
an  altogether  good  and  diseaseless  and  death- 
less individual  existence. 

When  a  man — in  order  to  attain  some  form 
of  that  happiness  toward  which  his  desire  is 
always  pointing — makes  the  mistake  of  injur- 
ing another,  it  is  not  his  desire  that  has  erred, 
but  his  intelligence.  His  desire  never  points 
towards  the  injury  of  another;  it  cannot  possi- 
bly do  so ;  it  is  a  portion  of  the  eternal  unity, 
an  intelligent  recognition  of  which,  leads  to  a 
condition  of  unbroken  harmony,  undying 
brotherhood  and  ever-enlarging  love. 

The  intelligence — which  is  the  individual- 
izing factor — does  little  else  thus  far  in  its 
growth  than  make  mistakes  as  it  gropes  blind- 
ly in  the  direction  of  the  absolute  truth  that 
there  is  no  death ;  that  all  is  Life. 

The  truth  that  all  is  Life  comes  only  with 
a  recognition  of  the  Law  of  Attraction.  Ever 
since  the  first  tiny  creature,  and  before,  the 
trend  of  ages  has  been  towards  the  knowing  of 
this  truth.     And  now  we  know  it. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  117 

To  know  it  is  to  be  conjoined  to  it  in  its 
diseaselessness  and  deathlessness.  To  know  it 
is  to  be  one  with  it. 

To  know  that  it  is  diseaseless  and  deathless 
is  to  know  that  it  is  also  sinless ;  it  is  to  know 
that  the  so-called  sins  of  the  race  have  been  like 
the  so-called  diseases,  nothing  more  than  the 
mistaken  beliefs  of  a  baby  race,  following  the 
dim  and  murky  lights  its  half-awakened  in- 
telligence yielded  it,  in  the  direction  it  thought 
would  lead  to  happiness. 

No  man  desires  to  be  a  criminal.  All  men 
desire  happiness.  It  is  the  mistaken  efforts 
to  gratify  a  desire  that  can  be  nothing  else  but 
holy,  that  create  the  mistaken  appearance 
of  sin  in  the  world,  and  fill  it  full  of  poor 
benighted  blunderers  whom  we  call  sin- 
ners. 

Until  the  growth  of  intelligence  in  the  race 
shall  demonstrate  this  to  be  true,  society  can 
do  no  better  than  to  protect  itself  from  the 
consequences  of  these  mistakes  and  their  mis- 
taken perpetrators  just  as  it  is  doing  now. 
But  a  time  is  coming  when  a  true  knowledge 


118  THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY. 

on  this  subject  will  convert  our  state  prisons 
into  colleges  where  the  truth  will  be  taught. 

More  and  more  the  power  we  have  ascribed 
to  "God" — the  Law — seems  to  be  centering  in  the 
individual.  It  is  evolving  through  the  indi- 
vidual's organization  and  is  being  expressed  by 
him ;  and  in  proportion  as  it  is  so  understood 
and  expressed,  man  trusts  his  fears  less  and 
his  desires  more. 

Man's  organism  is  the  intellectual  laboratory 
for  the  expression  or  the  making  visible  and 
available  the  power  of  the  Law  of  Attraction 
in  our  world  of  uses. 

The  power  exists ;  the  Law  exists ;  but  it 
might  as  well  not  exist  as  to  find  in  external 
life  no  recognition  of  it.  "Man  is  God's  ne- 
cessity." The  visible  world  is  the  chief  object 
of  creation,  and  the  Law  is  its  servant,  and  not 
its  master.  The  Law  is  simply  the  invisible 
frame-work  upon  which  man  strings  the 
wonderful  creations  of  his  genius ;  it  is  the  in- 
finite breath  of  life  that  flows  into  his  every 
thought,  and  makes  his  thoughts  external, 
visible  existences. 


THE    BLOSSOM   OF   THE    CENTURY.  119 

It  is  true  that  without  the  Law  man  could  not 
be ;  but  it  is  also  true  that  without  man  to  in- 
terpret the  Law,  and  so  make  it  manifest  ex- 
ternally, the  Law  might  as  well  not  be. 

The  belief  that  the  invisible  is  more  impor- 
tant than  the  visible  is  a  mistake.  The  belief 
that  individual  life,  as  it  refines  and  spiritual- 
izes, becomes  less  allied  to  the  visible  plane 
and  more  allied  to  the  invisible  plane,  is 
another  mistake. 

Individual  life  as  it  refines  and  spiritualizes 
will  attain  a  stability  and  a  fixedness,  a  pow- 
er of  cohesion  and  concentration  on  the  visi- 
ble plane,  infinitely  greater  than  it  now  pos- 
sesses. It  will  be  as  much  more  solid  than  it 
is  now  as  steel  is  more  solid  than  water;  it 
will  become  as  much  more  delicate  and  com- 
pact as  alabaster  is  more  delicate  and  compact 
than  sand.  The  refining  principle  that  comes 
through  the  growth  of  a  superior  intelligence 
will  not  disintegrate  individuals  or  cause 
them  to  disappear  from  the  external  world. 
Intellectual  growth  is  the  constant  replacement 
of  a  low  grade  of  thought  by  a  higher  grade  of 


120  THE    BLOSSOM   OF   THE    CENTURY. 

thought;  it  is  the  constant  acquisition  of  new 
truth ;  new  truth  relegates  to  the  past  every 
particle  of  old  truth,  which  in  the  light  of  the 
new  truth,  has  become  error  and  therefore  use- 
less. 

Every  atom  of  this  truth,  new  and  old,  is 
substance;  the  identical  stuff  our  bodies  and 
everything  else  we  see  are  made  of;  and  it 
changes  constantly.  If  we  keep  on  learning 
new  truth,  the  substance  of  our  bodies  refines; 
grows  stronger  and  more  beautiful.  If  we 
cease  to  learn,  this  substance  dries  up  and  falls 
to  the  earth  under  obedience  to  the  negative 
pole  of  the  Law  of  Attraction  which  says, 
"  The  dead  to  the  dead." 

Jesus  understood  this,  and  said:  "Let  the 
dead  bury  their  dead."  The  dead  are  burying 
their  dead  to-day  all  over  the  world.  But  the 
life  of  a  nobler  intelligence  has  appeared,  and 
death  itself  is  dying. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  121 

CHAPTER  XI. 


man's    power   to    speak    the    CREATIVE    WORD: 
EVOLUTION    OF    THE    IDEAL. 


To  make  visible ;  this  is  the  object  of  crea- 
tion. The  visible  universe  is  the  universe  of 
i^ses,  and  man's  theatre  of  ever-progressive 
action.  To  pull  out  from  his  own  brain  as  the 
spider  pulls  out  of  its  body,  an  unending  web 
of  creations ;  creations  that  suggest  other  crea- 
tions in  a  never-ending  procession  of  higher 
and  still  higher  and  more  potent  uses. 

At  a  certain  point  in  the  acquisition  of  intel- 
ligence, a  man  arrives  at  a  wonderful  fact;  he 
perceives  that  he  is  personally  creative;  sees 
that  his  spoken  word  has  the  power  of  life  in 
it ;  that  it  heals  the  sick,  banishes  old  age  and 
drives  death  away. 

He  does  this  through  the  power  of  the  Law 
made  personal. 

That  man  should  be  able  to  make  the  power 


122  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

of  the  Law  personal  in  himself,  is  so  wonderful 
a  truth  that  the  world  is  not  going  to  accept  it 
until  it  sees  it  demonstrated. 

But  even  now  the  fact  is  being  demonstrated 
in  sufficient  force  to  prove  to  the  unprejudiced 
observer  that  the  statement  I  have  made  is 
true. 

The  people,  as  a  whole,  are  not  looking  for 
anything  out  of  the  common  occurrences  of 
life;  their  preachers  and  their  teachers,  their 
body  tinkers  and  their  soul  tinkers  are  on  top 
of  them,  and  they  are  holding  them  down  with 
a  weight  as  of  mountains.  When  one  poor, 
struggling  creature  gets  from  under,  and  begins 
to  breathe  the  pure  air  of  higher  intelligence,  he 
distrusts  it  because  of  its  very  purity.  He  is 
afraid  of  it ;  its  grandeur  terrorizes  him ;  he  is 
tempted  to  crawl  back  to  his  old  stifling  posi- 
tion in  order  to  obtain  again  that  mental  stu- 
por he  is  fain  to  call  "his  peace  of  mind." 

The  rapidly  enlarging  thoughts  that  spring 
from  his  liberated  brain  can  find  no  soil  for 
their  germination ;  as  far  as  his  vision  can 
reach,  he  sees  but  an  arid  desert  waste,  inca- 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  123 

pable  of  responding  to  his  mental  touch.  He 
grows  hopeless ;  the  belief  in  himself  and  his 
own  ideas,  that  would  make  them  manifest  in 
external  form  in  spite  of  the  most  unfavora- 
ble conditions,  is  wanting;  the  disregardful 
world  drifts  over  his  genius  and  he  is  lost. 

Belief  is  the  clothing  power  of  which  desire 
is  the  spirit  or  soul. 

Belief  is  a  function  of  intelligence.  A  man 
believes  what  his  intelligence  shows  him  to  be 
true.  His  belief  is  his  fixed  perception  of  cer- 
tain facts.  As  his  perception  of  facts  changes, 
his  belief  changes. 

No  one  doubts  this ;  but,  when  I  say  that  his 
body  is  a  faithful  record  of  his  beliefs,  and 
shows  forth  every  change  of  his  perceptions, 
very  few  people  will  believe  it ;  and  yet  it  is 
true. 

Beliefs  with  slight  variations  run  in  grooves 
that  produce  established  types.  Cattle  repre- 
sent a  certain  set  of  beliefs,  and  we  have  their 
type.  Horses  represent  a  set  of  beliefs,  differ- 
ing somwhat  from  those  of  cattle,  and  we  have 
another  type.     Man  represents  another  set  of 


124  THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY. 

beliefs — a  more  intelligent  set  of  beliefs — and 
they  are  faithfully  registered  in  his  higher 
organization. 

There  has  been  very  little  change  in  man's 
beliefs  for  ages.  In  all  important  particulars, 
he  believes  substantially  what  he  believed  thou- 
sands of  years  ago.  He  represents  the  inherit- 
ed beliefs  of  many  generations.  His  beliefs 
have  been  somewhat  changed  in  a  few  particu- 
lars, but  the  body  of  his  beliefs  is  the  same. 
He  believes  himself  to  be  a  limited  creature; 
he  believes  that  God  made  him  in  His  own 
image,  and  that  God  holds  his  destiny  in  His 
hand.  He  leans  on  God  or  on  some  other  im- 
aginary power ;  and  it  is  his  disbelief  in  him- 
self as  his  own  maker  and  the  master  of  his 
own  destiny,  that  keeps  him  from  farther 
marked  and  substantial  advancement  in  his 
beliefs. 

His  intellect  is  locked  up  within  a  limit  of 
his  own  making,  and  though  he  is  slowly  widen- 
ing this  limit  in  spots,  he  is  contracting  it  in 
other  spots,  and  his  average  growth  out  of  his 
fetters  is  very  slow. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  125 

The  belief  lying  at  the  root  of  all  his 
hampering  beliefs  is  a  belief  in  the  deadness  of 
the  matter  out  of  which  he  thinks  his  body  is 
made.  He  carries  the  body  of  death  with  him 
from  the  cradle  to  the  grave.  In  spite  of  his 
ever-present  intuition  that  death  is  not  for  him, 
he  admits  its  existence  in  his  external  senses 
and  he  takes  the  consequences  of  the  admission, 
and  dies. 

The  few  years  of  his  life  are  insufficient  for 
anything  more  than  the  round  of  ideas  pur- 
sued by  his  father;  and  so  he  dies  without 
having  found  any  new  line  of  thought  by  which 
to  change  his  fixed  beliefs.  And  thus,  with 
human  belief  in  a  state  of  stagnation,  the  race 
itself  is  stagnant.  It  cannot  improve  in  any 
decidedly  marked  manner. 

The  idea  that  the  race  has  reached  its  ulti- 
mate development  is  one  of  the  most  absurd  of 
all  its  ideas.  It  may  be  that  the  human  form 
has  become  a  crude  expression  of  the  shape 
best  adapted  to  the  highest  use ;  and,  in  that 
case,  there  will  be  no  higher  race  of  animal 
creatures  than  man.     But,  if   this  is  so,  and  I 


126  THE    BLOSSOM   OF   THE    CENTURY. 

believe  it  is,  then  the  improvement  to  be  made 
in  him  by  a  constantly  growing  belief  in  his 
own  unlimited  power  will  show  forth — not  in 
any  marked  change  in  his  bodily  structure — 
but  in  an  ever-strengthening,  refining  and 
beautifying  process  of  his  present  structure. 

A  man  can  be  just  what  he  believes  he  can 
be,  after  he  understands  the  Law.  He  can  do 
just  what  he  believes  he  can  do,  after  he  has 
come  into  the  understanding  of  Being. 

Therefore,  personal  power  is  simply  a  matter 
of  the  understanding  of  truth ;  simply  a  course 
of  mental  training  in  the  right  direction ;  the 
direction  towards  freedom  from  every  one  of 
his  old  hampering  beliefs  in  his  own  limitation, 
and  a  consequent  emancipation  from  every 
description  of  fear. 

All  power  is  in  the  knowing.  By  the  word 
power,  I  do  not  mean  some  abstract,  far-away 
force,  but  a  present  personal  power;  a  power 
vested  in  the  individual  himself ;  the  power  to 
be  precisely  what  he  wants  to  be,  and  to  do 
precisely  what  he  wants  to  do.     A  man  has  no 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  127 

limitations  but  those  imposed  by  his  ignorance 
of  his  power. 

This  is  because  the  external  of  man  is  belief. 
What  he  believes— even  in  his  ignorance  of  the 
Law — he  is.  When  he  shall  come  into  an  un- 
derstanding of  the  Law,  and  know  that  it  does 
not  circumscribe  him  in  any  direction  what- 
ever, he  can  then  consult  his  desires  as  to  what 
he  desires  to  become ;  and,  recognizing  that  the 
Law  does  not  stand  in  the  way  of  his  becoming 
what  he  desires  to  be,  he  slowly  begins  to  grow 
into  it.  He  speaks  the  word  of  his  own  re- 
newed creation. 

He  slowly  begins  to  grow  into  the  new  form 
of  life  projected  by  his  ideal. 

I  say  "  slowly,"  because  at  first  this  complete 
change  of  belief  is  very  slow  indeed.  At  every 
step  of  his  progress  in  it  he  is  met  by  the  solid 
wall  of  his  previous  beliefs,  which  have  been 
compacted  in  him  by  a  thousand  generations  of 
ancestors.  He  not  only  meets  this  solid  wall 
in  himself,  but  he  can  scarcely  take  a  step  out- 
side of  himself  without  meeting  it  in  a  still 
more  unyielding  form  from  those  in  whom  it 


128     THE  BLOSSOM  OF  THE  CENTURY. 

has  never  been  shaken  at  all,  and  who  turn 
upon  him  like  enraged  beasts  when  they  begin 
to  feel  the  change  that  is  going  on  in  him. 
Truly,  he  who  would  step  up  to  a  higher  plane 
in  life,  must  be  brave  as  well  as  faithful  to  the 
best  he  knows. 

And  yet,  to  one  who  is  thoroughly  tired  of 
the  world  as  it  is,  tired  of  its  mediocre  attain- 
ments, tired  of  the  entire  range  of  its  cheap 
and  wretched  thought ,  any  change  however  dif- 
ficult seems  a  relief.  The  energies  are  stimulat- 
ed by  it ;  and  under  the  stimulus  greater  hopes 
are  born,  and  greater  courage  to  insure  their 
ripening. 

Anything  more  dismal  than  the  eternal  round 
of  small  events  that  swarm  our  pathway  from 
the  cradle  to  the  grave,  to  be  repeated  in  each 
successive  generation,  I  cannot  imagine.  No 
wonder  if  death  should  be  welcomed  by  the 
weary  pilgrim  after  his  third  or  fourth  journey 
over  this  arid  and  unchanging  scene.  If  a 
continued  existence  has  nothing  better  to  hold 
out  to  us  as  an  inducement  to  our  prolonged 
lives  here,  I  want  nothing  of  it. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  129 

The  same  thing  over  and  over  and  over  for 
thousands  of  years ;  this  has  been  the  history  of 
the  race.  A  generation  is  born;  it  drags 
through  untold  hardships,  gives  birth  to  an- 
other generation  and  dies. 

And,  under  the  circumstances,  it  ought  to  be 
glad  to  die.  It  has  no  incentive  to  live.  More- 
over, there  is  no  reason  why  it  should  live ;  its 
only  use,  so  far  as  its  growth  has  carried  it,  is 
to  propagate  its  kind  in  order  that  the  highest 
form  of  life  on  our  globe  shall  not  become 
extinct  until  the  knowledge  of  self-salvation, 
through  a  continued  growth,  unbroken  by 
death,  should  come  to  it. 

The  possibility  of  this  unbroken  line  of 
growth  in  the  individuals  of  the  race  has  been 
the  ever-alluring,  though  never  defined  hope  by 
which  it  was  possible  for  the  generations  to 
repeat  themselves,  until  such  time  as  human 
intelligence  had  come  to  that  point  of  devel- 
opment where  it  could  grasp  the  idea  of  per- 
petual and  undying  growth,  and  hold  fast  to 
it  until  it  became  fixed  in  these  forms  of  per- 
sonal belief,  which  we  call  our  bodies. 


130  THE    BLOSSOM   OF   THE    CENTURY. 

Indeed,  evolution,  in  its  whole  course,  has 
flowed  steadily  up  to  this  one  hope ;  or  rather 
because  self-perpetuation  was  an  ultimate  pos- 
sibility, all  life  has  ascended  the  scale  in  one 
unbroken  stream  of  higher  and  still  higher 
forms  towards  its  actualization. 

To  believe  it  possible  to  live  forever  in  con- 
stant progression  towards  more  refined  and 
more  powerful  conditions,  is  the  beginning  of 
growth  towards  these  conditions.  This  belief 
is  the  seed  germ  in  the  primordial  life  cell ;  it 
has  developed  in  us  on  the  unconscious  plane, 
that  is,  without  any  help  from  our  reasoning 
powers,  until  the  present  time. 

The  development  of  this  seed  germ  can  only 
go  a  certain  distance  on  the  unconscious  plane. 
The  time  comes  when  unconscious  growth — 
having  ripened  an  intellect  of  sufficient  power 
— demands  the  co-operation  of  that  intellect; 
or  at  least,  the  recognition  of  its  still  latent 
possibilities  by  that  intellect ;  or  it  develops  no 
farther.  This  is  the  period  when  a  transition 
from  unconscious  to  conscious  life  begins ;  in 
other  words,  it  is  a  transition  from  the  plane 


THE    BLOSSOM   OF    THE    CENTURY.  131 

wherein  life  lived  us,  to  the  higher  plane  where 
we  begin  to  live  ourselves,  or  to  do  our  own 
living  by  our  own  knowledge  of  how  to  do  it. 

The  unconscious  plane  of  life  is  that  plane 
in  which  we  recognize  the  Law  without  know- 
ing what  it  is,  and  without  giving  it  any  special 
thought.  We  simply  recognize  it  as  we  make 
it  manifest  through  use.  We  perform  all  the 
uses  of  life  because  life  is  in  us,  but  our  intel- 
ligences take  no  thought  about  it  in  any  way 
that  can  lead  to  practical  results.  We  know 
we  live,  and  that  is  about  all  we  do  know. 

When  unconscious  life,  as  expressed  in  uses, 
begins  to  become  conscious  life,  it  shows  forth 
in  a  strange  and  heretofore  unknown  awaken- 
ing of  the  intelligence ;  which,  as  it  proceeds, 
lifts  life  from  its  unconscious  plane,  its  plane 
of  uses,  to  a  plane  of  conscious  power  in  its  own 
ability  to  express  itself  in  logical  statements  of 
itself,  and  free  from  compulsory  expression  in 
those  uses,  which  previously,  had  been  its  only 
mode  of  expression. 

It  is  emancipated  from  the  position  of 
drudgery  that  was  the  natural  result    of    its 


132  THE    BLOSSOM   OF   THE    CENTURY. 

ignorance  of  its  own  ability  and  power,  into  a 
position  of  mastery,  when  its  own  logical  state- 
ment of  truth,  as  it  has  learned  it  by  self-in- 
trospection, establishes  its  station  in  the  world. 
For  instance,  the  man  reasons  this  way: 
He  says,  "  I  have  got  an  understanding  of  the 
power  vested  in  the  Law  of  Being ;  or  at  least 
an  understanding  of  enough  of  that  power  to 
know  that  nothing  can  circumscribe  it.  This 
for  the  first  part.  For  the  second  part,  I  per- 
ceive that  desire  is  the  individualized  expres- 
sion of  the  Law;  and  that  desire  is  made 
manifest  or  visible  in  the  external  world  by 
belief.  I  have  believed  in  the  power  of  the 
Law  unconsciously,  and  that  belief  has  mani- 
fested itself  in  all  the  organs  of  my  body,  and 
in  the  senses  that  relate  me  as  an  individual  to 
the  world  of  uses.  Having  realized  its  power 
even  before  I  learned  to  observe  it  and  reason 
on  it  intellectually,  now,  at  this  time,  when  I 
do  observe  it  and  reason  upon  it  intellectually, 
I  am  beginning  to  be  amazed  at  my  own  stu- 
pidity, and  the  stupidity  of  the  race,  that  so 
little  should  be  understood  about  it. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  133 

For  if  an  unconscious  or  dumb  and  blind 
belief  should  have  brought  me  up  to  my  pres- 
ent standpoint  in  creation,  what  will  not  a 
conscious  or  intelligent  belief  do  for  me ;  a 
belief,  that,  knowing  something  of  the  Law, 
can  co-operate  wHh  it  in  its  manifestation  in 
my  body  ?" 

If  the  Law  can  manifest  through  olind  be- 
lief, as  it  does  do,  how  much  more  powerfully 
can  it  manifest  through  the  intelligent  belief 
that  meets  its  every  manifestation  with  a 
ready  appreciation  of  its  meaning? 

The  action  of  the  Law  is  co-related  to  the 
action  of  the  intelligence ;  the  greater  the  ac- 
tivity of  the  intelligence,  the  greater  the  ac- 
tivity of  the  Law  in  manifesting.  So  long  as 
the  power  of  the  Law  to  manifest  was  con- 
fined to  the  dumb  intelligence  of  the  body, 
an  intelligence  that  reciprocated  only  in  added 
functions  to  the  body,  it  continued  to  build 
the  body  until  the  body  needed  no  more  of 
those  functions  that  expressed  life  only  in 
uses.     It  had  reached  a  shape  of  such   propor- 


134  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

tions  as  perhaps  best  fitted  it  for  its  journey 
through  eternity. 

But  suppose  the  Law  could — at  this  stage 
of  man's  development — simply  hold  the  man 
in  existence,  without  any  farther  attempt  at 
the  recognition  of  truth  on  his  part,  what  ob- 
ject would  be  served  in  the  economy  of  hu- 
man development  ? 

None  at  all.  We  should  have  a  race  stag- 
nant at  the  completion  of  its  animal  life;  a 
race  not  able  to  go  alone  in  its  own  growing 
strength,  and  not  worth  carrying ,  because  of 
its  helpnessness,  its  disease  and  deformity  and 
brutality.  Such  a  condition  would  furnish  us 
with  a  spectacle  of  arrested  growth  on  so  huge 
a  scale  as  to  be  beyond  comparison  with  any- 
thing of  the  kind  ever  witnessed  in  the  uni- 
verse. 

But  this  is  precisely  the  spectacle  we  have 
been  looking  upon  for  thousands  of  years 
here  on  this  planet.     What  does  it  mean? 

It  means  that  the  Law  reciprocates  our 
unconscious  recognition  up  to  a  certain  point 
only,  and    never  goes  beyond   that  point.     It 


THE    BLOSSOM    CF    THE    CENTURY.  135 

reaches  that  point  with  each  generation.  Each 
generation  then  falls  away  from  this  uncon- 
scious recognition ;  it  dies,  and  another  gen- 
eration follows  in  its  footsteps,  to  again  cease 
its  unconscious  recognition  of  the  Law  and 
die. 

And  what  cares  the  Law?  The  Law  is  un- 
heeding. The  Law  bends  to  no  one's  cries  or 
prayers.  It  is  not  generous ;  it  has  no  moral 
quality ;  it  is  simply  the  Principle  of  Attrac- 
tion ;  the  attractive  and  cohesive  power  of  the 
universe.  It  is  unchanging;  it  sim^ply  IS. 
"  Men  may  come  and  men  may  go,  "  but  it 
exists  forever! 

But  in  all  these  wretched  rounds  of  the 
ripening  generations,  the  upper  brain  has  been 
building ;  the  brain  that  begins  to  realize  and 
trust  and  believe  in  the  IDEAL. 

And  what  has  the  ideal  promised?  It  has 
promised  us  happiness ;  and  happiness  means 
freedom  in  its  best  sense ;  freedom  from  the 
bonds  that  have  been  festering  more  and  more 
in  our  worn  senses  as  the  ideal  brain  grew; 
freedom  from  all  our  past  conditions.     "Con- 


136  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

ditions"  is  a  word  that,  being  interpreted  by 
the  new  meaning  which  the  advancing  truth 
has  placed  upon  it,  is  synonymous  with  "be- 
liefs." For,  if  a  man  is  all  mind,  as  to  his  per- 
sonality, then  his  conditions  are  his  beliefs, 
and  his  beliefs  are  his  conditions. 

And  so  the  ideal  brain  is  promising  us  re- 
lief from  the  old  beliefs  that  have  held  us  so 
long  in  the  ruts  of  dead  but  unburied 
thought.  It  is  not  only  furnishing  us  with 
new  hopes,  but  it  is  showing  us  the  feasibility 
of  trusting  these  hopes  to  their  utmost ;  and 
trusting  them,  they  will  lift  us  away  from  the 
broken  generations  that  are  the  result  of  our 
unconscious  recognition  of  the  Law,  into  the 
one  unbroken  generation  that  will  begin  as 
soon  as  we  yield  to  the  leadings  of  the  ideal 
and  place  our  trust  upon  the  infinite  possibil- 
ities latent  in  the  Law ;  possibilities  we  have 
never  yet  prospected  for. 

It  is  the  growing  brain,  the  development  of 
the  ideal  faculties  that  gives  us  power  at  this 
time  to  perceive  more  of  the  power  latent  in 
the  Law  than  we  have  ever  before  seen.    And  as 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  137 

it  is  a  fact  that — the  body  being  all  mind — the 
more  we  see  of  the  power  of  the  Law,  the  more 
that  power  becomes  incarnate  in  us,  it  there- 
fore follows  that  the  race  is  going  to  accom- 
plish the  effort  of  centuries,  and  cross  the 
line  between  its  unconscious  life  of  the  past, 
and  enter  a  condition  of  conscious  life  for  the 
future. 

The  ideal  faculty  in  its  development  makes 
our  desires  seem  plausible  and  possible  of  re- 
alization. No  inferior  faculty  of  the  brain 
has  ever  done  this  or  ever  can  do  it.  The  Ideal 
has  not  only  opened  the  external  world  up  be- 
fore us,  and  given  us  new  incentives  to  life 
and  effort,  but  it  has  opened  new  departments 
in  the  body  that  correlate  the  external ;  that 
are  adapted  to  the  external,  and  that — under 
the  Law  of  Attraction — will  unite  with  the 
external  in  a  new  growth,  and  a  nobler  growth 
than  the  race  has  yet  had. 

There  is  no  doubt  at  all  that  it  has  been 
exclusively  by  the  race's  growing  recognition 
of  desire,  that  the  ideal  faculties  have  been 
built.     The   ideal  brain  is  the  new  laboratory 


138  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

which  desire  has  formed  for  the  expression  of 
its  own  peculiar  characteristics.  Desire  has 
formed  it  in  order  to  make  itself  visible  and 
audible  in  the  world  of  effects.  Desire,  as  a 
latent  and  greatly  ignored  function,  desired  to 
be  recognized  by  the  individual  in  whose 
economy  it  played  so  important  a  part;  and 
in  order  to  do  this,  it  had  to  build  a  laboratory 
in  the  human  brain  for  the  expression  of 
itself.  And  so  we  have  the  faculty  of  ideality. 
And  it  is  the  growth  of  this  faculty  that  is 
now  pledged  to  lift  us  to  a  recognition  of  the 
vast  importance  of  the  Law  within  us  as  ex- 
pressed in  desire. 

It  is  teaching  us  even  now,  in  spite  of  the 
contempt  heaped  on  our  desires  by  generations 
of  theologians,  to  respect  desire  in  ourselves 
and  others  It  is  teaching  a  few  of  us  to  stand 
by  our  desires  and  uphold  them  as  we  would 
stand  by  and  uphold  our  own  lives ;  for  we 
know  that  desire  is  the  life  principle  within  us 
and  that  it  is  death  to  ignore  it. 

In  speaking  of  desire,  the  life  principle 
in     man,     it    seems    unnecessary  to   guard   it 


THE    BLOSSOM    OP    THE    CENTURY.  139 

against  the  misapprehension  that  has  always 
clouded  it  in  public  opinion.  Public  opinion  is 
a  very  shallow  stream ;  and  no  defense  that  I 
can  make  of  a  word  which  has  lain  so  long  un- 
der the  drifts  of  theological  rubbish  will  be  un- 
derstood. To  the  thinkers,  I  have  only  to  re- 
peat what  I  said  once  before  in  these  pages ; 
that  desire  is  the  implanted  life  principle, 
without  which  no  plant  or  animal,  no  organic 
form,  could  ever  move  at  all ;  indeed,  there 
could  be  no  organic  form;  for  the  principle 
of  cohesion  would  not  be  expressed  in  indiv- 
iduals. 

Desire  points  always  in  one  direction ;  the 
direction  of  happiness. 

That  the  individual  should  make  most  griev- 
ous mistakes  in  seeking  the  happiness  towards 
which  desire  always  points,  is  because  the 
individual  in  his  external  life  is  a  mental 
creature,  whose  only  chance  to  grow  is  by 
projecting  experimental  efforts  here,  there  and 
everywhere ;  and  by  the  results  of  these  ex- 
periments, he  judges  for  himself  whether  he  is 
right  or  wrong.     In  this  way  he  has  built   him- 


14C  THE    BLOSSOM    OK   THE    CENTURY. 

self  from  the  smallest  possible  life,  up  to  the 
most  powerful  life  on  our  globe.  And  in  the 
same  way,  he  will  go  on  building  himself  un- 
til experience  shall  teach  him  that  his  highest 
happiness  hangs  on  the  great  moral  law  laid 
down  by  Jesus;  "Whatsoever  ye  would  that 
others  should  do  unto  you,  do  ye  also  unto 
them." 

In  believing  in  my  desires,  I  believe  in  the 
Law  of  Attraction  in  my  body.  The  Law  of 
Attraction  is  the  power  that  holds  the  atoms  of 
my  body  in  cohesion.  In  our  unconscious  life 
the  Law  acts  without  our  knowing  it ;  it  holds 
the  atoms  of  our  bodies  compact  until  we  reach 
the  point  of  our  highest  development,  or  until 
we  are  grown.  Then,  if  our  conscious  knowledge 
of  its  power  could  hitch  on  to  our  unconscious 
knowledge  of  it,  the  power  would  still  operate 
to  hold  the  atoms  in  such  close  relation  to 
each  other  that  we  would  not  grow  any  older. 

But  when  we  fail  to  recognize  the  Law  in  our , 
bodies  as  expressed  in  desire,  then  at  the  point 
when  the  unconscious  life  drops  us,  we  begin  to 
grow  old.     The  growing  old  process  is  simply  a 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  14i 

process  of  disintegration  or  falling  apart  of  the 
atoms,  because  we  do  not  begin  the  process  of 
conscious  recognition,  and  the  power  vested  in 
unconscious  recognition  begins  to  fail.  We  are 
then  in  a  condition  of  negation,  wherein  the 
atoms  or  cells  lose  their  magnetic  relation  to 
each  other  more  and  more.  As  this  goes  on, 
the  different  organs  of  the  body  become  dead- 
ened to  each  other's  magnetisms,  and  become 
slack  in  their  action,  until  the  whole  system 
gets  to  be  like  an  old  machine  whose  wheels 
have  worn  smaller  and  smoother  until  the  cogs 
do  not  act  in  a  way  to  move  all  its  parts  har- 
moniously. This  is  the  condition  we  call  old 
age. 

A  similar  condition  may  exist  in  youth ; 
there  may  be  a  non-recognition  of  the  Law  of 
Attraction  on  the  unconscious  plane  of  a  child  ; 
and  the  child  may  express  the  condition  in  many 
forms  of  error  called  disease.  And  every  form 
of  it  is  non-recognition,  either  consciously  or 
unconsciously,  of  the  Law  of  Attraction  in  the 
individual  as  expressed  in  desire. 

A  sick  person  may  have  a  hundred  desires, 


142  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

and  the  desire  to  live,  more  than  all  others ; 
but  even  having  the  desire  in  its  greatest  devel- 
opment, he  does  not  trust  it ;  and  it  is  power- 
less to  save  him. 

He  must  not  only  be  conscious  of  his  desire, 
but  he  must  know  that  desire  is  the  saving 
power,  and  that  to  trust  it  fully,  to  believe  in  it 
as  a  saving  power,  he  will  be  saved. 

This  is  what  the  Bible  means  when  it  speaks 
of  the  saving  power  of  God,  and  of  how  God 
will  save  to  the  uttermost  all  who  trust  Him. 
The  old  prophets  and  teachers  of  that  long  past 
age,  when  the  Bible  was  written,  had  an  inkling 
of  the  truth  of  this  matter.  For  their  God  is 
the  Law ;  it  is  expressed  in  man  in  desire ;  and 
when  comprehended  and  trusted,  the  result  is 
absolute  and  indestructible  and  ever-refining 
and  progressive  life. 

By  the  understanding  of  his  own  power  as 
related  to  the  Law  of  Being,  a  man's  spoken 
word  will  re-create  him. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OP   THE    CENTURY.  143 

CHAPTER  XII. 


THE    TREATMENT    OF    DISEASE    ON     THE    MENTAL 
PLANE. 


From  the  mental  standpoint,  disease  is  error ; 
it  cannot  consistently  be  called  anything  else. 

If  all  is  life,  as  it  surely  is  in  absolute  truth, 
and  if  man  is  an  individualized  understanding 
of  the  life,  then  he  may  be  said  to  be  a  mental 
statement  of  the  Law ;  and  a  statement  which 
he  himself  has  made.  Not  knowing  the  abso- 
lute truth  that  all  is  Life;  knowing,  indeed, 
nothing  of  the  Law ;  not  being  able  to  give 
anything  like  a  reasonable  account  of  himself ; 
simply  feeling  that  he  lives,  it  cannot  be  oth- 
erwise than  that  his  statement  of  being  should 
be  extremely  weak,  and  full  of  errors. 

Errors  of  intelligence  are  simply  negations 
of  the  Law,  through  ignorance  of  its  existence. 
These  negations  of  absolute  truth  show  forth  in 


144  THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY. 

a  hundred  forms  of  weak  and  erroneous  beliefs. 
The  body  being  mind,  fixed  beliefs,  the  errors 
were  recorded  in  it  just  in  the  degree  and  char- 
acter of  their  weakness. 

Everybody  was  ignorant  of  the  Law.  No 
two  persons  were  ignorant  precisely  in  the 
same  way  and  to  the  same  extent.  So  these  va- 
rious shades  and  grades  of  ignorance  were  so 
many  different  erroneous  statements.  These 
beliefs  were  predicated  upon  the  basis  of  a 
fixed  conviction  in  the  perishability  of  matter; 
beliefs  based  upon  the  accepted  idea  that  mat- 
ter is  perishable,  could  not  do  otherwise  than 
result  in  death  sooner  or  later. 

The  race  takes  the  consequences  of  its  be- 
liefs ;  a  thing  it  could  not  do  but  for  the  fact 
that  it  is  all  mind,  and  that  every  man's  body 
is  a  statement  of  his  beliefs,  either  acquired  by 
himself  or  inherited  from  his  parents,  or  both  ; 
modified  in  nearly  all  instances,  by  the  beliefs 
of  those  about  him. 

For,  until  a  man  has  learned  to  think  him- 
self out  of  the  fixed  beliefs  of  the  race,  by  a 
recognition    of    his   own     freedom  through   a 


THE    BLOSSOM   OF    THE    CENTURY.  145 

knowledge  of  the  Law,  he  meets  with  constant 
environment  from  the  opinions  of  others ;  and 
this  environment  does  have  its  influence  in 
shaping  him. 

No  man  has  any  mode  of  thought  that  is  ab- 
solutely and  unalterably  fixed,  until  he  comes 
into  the  knowledge  of  the  Law.  Then  all  his 
thoughts  begin  to  adjust  themselves  to  his 
knowledge  of  absolute  truth,  and  gradually  the 
entire  bulk  of  his  former  fixed  beliefs  (his 
body)  begins  to  change. 

It  does  not  change  its  type,  but  its  type  be- 
gins to  relax,  so  as  to  admit  of  a  series  of  all- 
over  improvements,  corresponding  with  his  re- 
vised beliefs  in  absolute  truth ;  the  truth  that 
all  is  life ;  and  therefore  good  and  desirable. 

When  man  arrives  at  the  knowledge  of  this 
one  absolute  truth,  he  has  a  firm  foundation 
under  him  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of 
the  race.  He  now  has  a  logical  basis  of  fact 
from  which  to  make  a  new  statement  of  him- 
self. The  statement  of  himself  which  he  has 
inherited,  is  not  and  never  has  been  a  state- 
ment for  which  he,  as  a  reasoning  creature,    is 


146  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY, 

responsible.  It  is  a  statement  of  the  develop- 
ing animalhood  of  all  th?.  past,  which  has 
culminated  in  him,  and  which  he  has  ac- 
cepted in  unconsciousness  of  the  fact  that  he 
could  make  a  statement  that  would  suit  him 
better. 

But  he  could  make  no  better  statement  so  long 
as  he  believed  himself  to  be  a  creation  of  some 
force  outside  of  himself.  He  could  make  no 
better  statement  so  long  as  he  did  not  know 
by  what  means  his  present  statement  had  been 
made;  he  could  not  even  make  any  special 
change  in  the  statement  of  himself;  he  was 
helpless  as  a  log  in  his  ignorance  of  the  Law, 
and  of  his  own  power  under  the  Law.  And  so 
the  same  statement  simplv  kept  repeating 
itself  over  and  over  withjut  any  marked 
departure  from  the  fixed  type  until  now. 

But  now  the  greatest  truth  that  has  ever 
dawned  on  the  race  is  here ;  the  absolute 
truth  that  all  is  Life ;  and  there  is  no  disease, 
no  death  and  no  old  age ;  and  that  this  truth 
simply  awaits  universal  recognition  in  order 
that  its  vitalizing  influence  shall   be   expressed 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  147 

in  one  unbroken  current  through  all  the  mem- 
bers of  the  race. 

I  refer  again  to  that  wonderful  book,  the 
Bible.  "Believe,"  says  the  Bible,  "and  you 
shall  be  saved."  How  can  belief  save  a  man 
unless  he  is  all  mind? 

Believe  in  whom? 

"Believe  in  God;"  these  are  the  words. 

Believe  in  the  power  of  the  Law ;  these  are 
equivalent  words. 

God  and  man  are  one ;  the  Law  and  man  are 
one.  God,  the  Law,  is  subjective  man.  The 
race  is  God,  the  Law,  made  objective. 

The  Law  being  the  unchangeable  Life  Prin- 
ciple, it  cannot  be  diseased  and  it  cannot  die. 
Intelligence  may  weaken  in  its  recognition  of 
the  Law  on  the  unconscious  plane,  and  this 
weakening  will  be  called  disease.  Or  it  may 
cease  to  recognize  it  altogether  on  the  uncon- 
scious plane,  and  this  will  be  called 
death. 

Is  it  really  disease  and  death?  Certainly 
not.     It  is  simply   the   individual  cessation   of 


148     THE  BLOSSOM  OP  THE  CENTURY. 

any   farther  power   to   recognize   Life;   but  it 
is  not  the  death  of  Life. 

Non-recognition  of  Life,  Life  that  is  self-ex- 
istent and  eternal,  is  no  more  evidence  that 
death  exists,  than  a  blind  man's  belief  in  dark- 
.aess  is  evidence  that  no  light  exists. 

Therefore  disease  is  error ;  and  it  cannot  be 
called  anything  else, 

If  you  knew  your  neighbor  was  laboring  un- 
der some  mistaken  opinion,  would  you  pre 
scribe  a  porous  plaster  and  a  dose  of  calomel  in 
order  to  change  it?  Would  you  not  rather  ex- 
pect that  the  best  course  would  be  to  reason 
with  him  until  you  had  convinced  him  that 
he  was  in  an  error? 

Even  if  his  condition  of  error  had  culmina- 
ted in  the  almost  total  destruction  of  his  mind, 
and  his  conduct  endangered  the  lives  of  those 
about  him,  so  that  he  had  to  be  tied  or  put  un- 
der the  influence  of  a  narcotic,  until  such  time 
as  the  truth  could  be  planted  in  his  intelligence 
so  firmly  as  to  convince  him  of  his  mistake 
would  not  this  course  be  more  reasonable  than 
the  former  one? 


THE    BLOSSOM  OF    THE    CENTTTBY.  149 

If  I  have  made  it  clear  that  man,  as  to 
his  external  or  visible  side,  is  mind,  and  not 
matter,  I  know  that  every  reader  will  answer 
yes. 

Being  actually  startled  with  this  idea  when 
it  was  first  presented  to  me,  I  kept  experiment- 
ing with  it  until  I  demonstrated  that  it  would 
work  perfectly  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten. 

And  perhaps  the  strangest  part  of  it  was, 
that  in  making  the  argument  that  convinced 
the  patients  of  their  error  in  believing  in  dis- 
ease, I  always  did  it  silently.  I  seldom  spoke 
aloud  to  any  of  them ;  and  when  they  were 
cured  they  knew  no  more  of  my  method  than 
when  they  first  came.  Some  of  them  said 
God  worked  through  me  to  perform  the  cure. 
Others  believed  that  I  had  an  exceptionally 
strong  "power  in  pray«r,"  and  did  not  know 
that  prayei  and  every  other  form  of  leaning 
and  begging  was  as  far  as  possible  from  my 
method.  Some  unusually  ignorant  people 
thought  it  a  species  of  witchery,  and  held  me 
in  great  awe.  It  came  to  be  believed  that  T 
Bould  raise  the  dead,  and  do  manv  other  things 


150  THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY. 

that  I  was  not  able  to  do.  The  report  of  my 
power  over  disease  spread  far  and  wide  by 
word  of  mouth,  and  people  came  to  me  from 
clear  across  the  continent,  not  only  to  be  cured, 
but  to  know  how  it  was  done. 

It  was  done  by  thought  transferrence,  but  it 
was  the  transferrence  of  a  very  unusual  char- 
acter of  thought 

In  the  early  pages  of  this  book,  I  tried  to 
establish  the  fact  that  thoughts  are  things. 
They  are  substantial,  though  usually  invisi- 
ble entities ;  and  it  is  in  the  power  of  the 
thinker  to  send  them  from  him  into  the  organ- 
isms of  others,  where  they  are  not  only  the 
messengers,  but  the  messages  themselves,  that 
are  transferred  from  one  brain  to  another. 
They  leave  the  strong  and  positive  brain  of 
the  person  who  is  grounded  in  the  belief  that 
there  is  no  disease  and  no  death,  and  they 
take  their  abode  in  the  brain  of  the  one  whose 
beliefs  are  so  lacking  in  knowledge  of  the 
absolute  truth  as  to  render  him  negative  to 
higher  thought  forms  than  his  own ;  and  here 
they  remain,   carrying   conviction   to   the  pa- 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  151 

tient,  of  his  mistake,  and  thus  healing  him,  as 
the  term   goes. 

In  healing  a  patient,  there  are  two  points 
to  be  noticed  in  the  silent  argument  ap- 
plied. 

The  first  is  a  consideration  of  the  fact  that 
there  is  no  disease.  This  truth  is  universal. 
But,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  it  is  universal, 
and  therefore  of  the  first  importance,  it  goes 
for  nothing  unless  individual  application  can 
be  made  of  it. 

The  Law  is  one  thing,  and  the  understanding 
of  the  Law  is  another  thing.  The  Law — in  its 
majesty,  simply  is.  Man,  who  is  the  individu- 
alized comprehension  of  the  Law,  changes 
perpetually ;  changes  ip  proportion  as  he 
knows  more  and  more. 

It  seems  easier  to  define  the  Law  than  to 
define  the  man.  He  is  a  bundle  of  desires. 
By  these  desires,  he  is  related  to  everything 
that  he  desires.  The  existence  of  his  desires 
proves  conclusively  that  what  he  desires  exists, 
and  is  for  him.  His  desires — taken  in  the 
aggregate — are  the  sure  prophecy  of  their   own 


152  THE   BLOSSOM   OF   THE   CENTURY. 

fulfiHrnent.  They  point  towards  happiness, 
and  thus  include  health,  opulence  and 
beauty. 

Under  no  influence  imaginable  but  that 
power  vested  in  the  Law  of  Attraction,  could 
the  man  be  related  to  the  object  of  his  desires 
in  a  way  to  insure  their  fulfillment.  He  is 
therefore  allied  to  the  Law  of  Attraction  and 
dependent  upon  it. 

But  he  ia  not  dependent  upon  it  as  a  slave 
is  dependent  on  his  master.  He  depends  upon 
it  as  a  freeman  depends  upon  his  own  efforts. 
He  knows  that  it  will  serve  him  in  every  effort 
he  may  make. 

These  efforts  are  all  intellectual ;  they  are 
all  of  them  the  strivings  of  an  earnest  soul  in 
the  pursuit  of  truth.  Knowledge  of  truth  is 
the  only  saviour,  and  he  knows  it.  Knowledge 
of  truth  means  greater  knowledge  of  the  power 
of  the  Law. 

This  is  what  he  desires ;  greater  knowledge 
of  the  power  of  the  Law.  All  of  his  desires, 
even  unknown  to  himself,  tend  to  this.  Each 
acquisition  of  knowledge  he  may  make  helps  to 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY.  153 

liberate  him  from  the  bonds  of  his  past  ignor- 
ance ;  from  the  wretched  beliefs  that  made  them- 
selves manifest  as  disease,  old  age  and  death. 

Knowledge  is  power,  and  power  is  freedom, 
and  freedom  is  happiness.  This  is  the  happi- 
ness that  includes  all  those  minor  details  of 
health,  opulence  and  beauty. 

Therefore,  as  close  a  definition  of  man  as  we 
can  come  to,  is  to  call  him  an  ever-growing 
desire ;  approximating — in  hie  growth — more 
and  more  closely  to  a  comprehension  of  the 
power  of  the  Law. 

The  more  a  man  perceives  of  the  power  of 
the  Law,  the  more  of  that  power  he  incarnates 
in  himself.  He  thus  becomes  at  every  step 
of  his  advancement,  to  use  an  old  phrase, 
"nearer  to  God;"  a  state  of  at-one-ment  with 
the  Law,  that  theologians*  would  call  making 
the  atonement. 

Perceiving,  then,  that  man  is  a  bundle  of  de- 
sires, all  of  which  point  to  the  attainment  of 
trutii-  we  recognize  his  desires  as  legitimate; 
and  in  our  silent  reasoning  with  him,  we  strive 

justify  him  in  his  own  estimation  by  remov- 


154  THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY. 

ing  the  prejudice  he  has  always  had  against  de- 
sire. 

The  bulk  of  mankind  are  not  only  prejudiced 
against  their  own  desires,  but  they  are  afraid  of 
them.  Their  knowledge  of  desire  is  confined  to 
the  many  mistakes  heaped  upon  it  by  the  ex- 
perimenting ignorance  that  necessarily  marks 
the  growth  of  an  infant  race. 

Therefore,  to  justify  the  patient,  in  the 
promptings  of  his  own  spirit,  as  expressed  in 
desire,  is  one  of  the  first  efforts  of  the  silent 
argument  made  to  him.  He  is  doubtful 
whether  he  has  any  true  right  to  live  at  all. 
He  sees  himself  a  bundle  of  desires,  all  lead- 
ing— as  he  believes — to  narrow  and  selfish  ends. 
He  does  not  see  the  great  object  towards  which 
the  race  is  being  drawn,  and  into  which  it  will 
all  be  harmonized;  his  opinion  of  his  own 
utility,  as  a  member  of  society,  is  more  than 
doubtful ;  and  he  says,  "  I  would  like  to  live 
and  get  well,  if  it  is  God's  will." 

His  intelligence  has  yielded  him  no  truth 
that  will  justify  his  desire  to  live  and  get  well ; 
and  so  he  leaves  it  for  some  one  else  to  decide. 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY.  155 

He  is  completely  off  his  own  base ;  and  in  en- 
deavoring to  rest  upon  another,  he  has  become 
as  a  plant  whose  roots  are  pulled  up  out  of  the 
ground,  and  can  find  no  nourishment  in  that 
condition. 

And  BO  it  becomes  the  effort  of  the  silent 
argument  addressed  to  him,  to  strengthen  him 
in  his  belief  of  himself;  to  justify  his  desires  to 
him,  and  to  establish  the  ego  firmly  in  his 
thought. 

This  gives  him  mental  strength,  and  as  his 
mental  condition  is  his  bodily  condition,  it 
gives  him  bodily  strength. 

To  recognize  desire  in  the  patient,  is  to  recog- 
nize what  he  fails  to  recognize  in  himself.  This 
recognition  on  the  part  of  another  has  the 
same  effect  in  his  body  as  if  he  recognized  it 
intelligently  and  consciously  himself.  And  so 
the  patient  may  be  healed  without  being  aware 
of  the  character  of  the  great  truth  that  has  been 
poured  into  his  body. 

His  body,  being  to  a  great  degree  a  fixed 
thing,  possesses  less  vitality  than  his  active 
thought ;  and  very  much  less  than  the  thought 


156  THE    BLOSSOM   OF    THE    CENTURY. 

of  the  person  effecting  the  cure.  The  body  of 
the  patient,  then,  is  decidedly  negative  in  com- 
parison with  the  living  truth  being  poured  into 
it,  and  it  gives  an  unconscious  response  to  it ; 
in  the  meantime  the  patient's  own  thought  is 
comparatively  untouched.  At  least,  it  has  not 
been  suflBiciently  influenced  by  the  more  positive 
thought  of  the  healer  to  come  to  an  under- 
standing of  the  truth  by  which  the  body  is 
healed. 

That  the  patient's  thought  is  more  or  less 
impressed  by  the  healer's  more  positive  thought, 
is  often  proved  by  the  questions  he  asks  after- 
wards ;  but  I  have  never  known  a  case  where 
his  thought — his  active  intelligence — received 
the  whole  truth,  as  communicated  silently  by 
the  healer. 

The  patient,  in  submitting  himseif  to  the 
healer,  does  practically  submit  to  him  his  own 
beliefs,  in  order  to  have  the  healer  change 
them  But  he  does  this  when  he  consults  a 
physician ;  the  physician  then,  proceeds  to 
changfi  the  patient's   beliefs  by  his  own  mors 


THE   BL08S0M    OF   '^HE   CENTURY.  157 

positive  belief  in  the  power  of  medicine,  and 
he  very  often  succeeds  in  doing  it. 

Where  a  person  rejects  the  new  truth,  the 
truth  that  there  is  no  disease,  and  refuses  to 
submit  his  beliefs  to  manipulation  by  the 
mental  method,  he  creates  a  barrier  that  pre- 
vents the  natural  tendency  of  higher  thought 
to  seek  its  level.  But  even  in  this  case,  the 
higher  and  more  positive  thought  will  eventu- 
ally break  down  the  barrier  and  enter. 

Even  now,  in  this  silent  way,  there  can  be  no 
high  and  positive  thought  generating  anywhere 
that  does  not  raise  the  average  thought  of  the 
entire  race  a  little  higher. 

The  patient  who  believes  in  the  power  of 
another's  thought  to  cure  him,  removes  all 
barriers  to  the  entrance  of  that  thought,  and 
soon  feels  the  effect  of  it.  It  was  on  this 
plan  that  Jesus  healed ;  and  it  was  his  know- 
ledge of  the  matter  that  caused  him  to  say : 
'According  to  thy  faith,  so  be  it  unto  you." 
He  made  no  test  cases  of  unbelievers ;  he  knew 
he  was  hedged  out  of  their  minds.  Nor  did  he 
heal  all  he  attempted  to  heal.     For,  "when  he 


158  THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY. 

went  down  into  Capernaum,  he  did  no  mighty 
works  there,  because  of  their  unbelief." 

Individuality  is  a  very  potent  thing  indeed. 
It  stands  above  all  things  except  the  Law.  It 
shall  not  be  set  aside  and  overcome  even  that 
it  may  be  made  healthy  and  opulent  and  beau- 
tiful. Clothed  in  the  rags  of  error,  and  too 
wretched  to  make  farther  effort  in  its  own  be- 
half, it  is  still  the  seed  germ  of  all  future 
growth ;  its  ego  is  obscured,  but  not  destroyed ; 
and  no  power  can  prevail  against  it  until  it 
resigns  itself. 

I  cannot  enter  the  realm  of  your  ego  without 
your  consent.  I  may  conquer  you  bodily  and 
make  a  slave  of  you,  only  to  groan  in  despair 
at  the  knowledge  that  the  independent  ego 
within  your  breast  scorns  me,  and  holds  fast  in 
its  own  right  every  thought  that  fortifies  the 
citadel  where  it  resides  —  unassailable,  inde- 
structible, haughty. 

A  realization  of  the  majesty  of  the  undying 
ego  is  a  strong  point  in  the  argument  addressed 
to  the  patient.  The  more  it  is  dwelt  upon,  the 
more   firm   and   invincible   it   seems,  and   the 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF   TKE    CENTURY.  159 

more  irresistible  its  demands.  Indeed,  as  its 
strength  grows  upon  one's  thought,  the  desires 
that  proceed  from  it  seem  commands  that  no 
power  can  disobey ;  it  becomes  a  focus  for  the 
centralization  of  all  things  desirable;  and  to 
the  opened  spiritual  sense  all  things  appear  to 
be  drifting  to  it  in  helpless  obedience  to  its 
calm  mastery. 

Thus  is  individuality  more  powerfully  indiv- 
idualized in  the  patient  until  a  sense  of  strength 
comes  to  him,  that  causes  him  to  lose  sight  of 
the  negative  beliefs  that  formerly  held  a  place 
in  his  mind ;  and  he  knows  that  he  is  well, 
though  he  knows  not  why. 

And  so  the  two  points  in  removing  his  false 
beliefs  have  been  freely  used ;  sometimes  one 
and  sometimes  the  other,  as  each  in  its  turn 
appeared  the  mor-e  impressive. 

There  are  occasions  when  it  is  enough  for 
him  who  is  required  to  make  this  silent  argu- 
ment, to  merely  bring  himself  into  a  clear  per- 
ception of  the  fact  that  there  is  no  disease  and 
no  death.  This  is  rising  into  the  realm  of 
absolute  truth,  and  seeing  all  things  from  that 


160  THE   BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY. 

standpoint;  but  it  is  a  universal  and  not  an 
individual  argument.  The  individual  argu- 
ment is  that  which  perceives  the  ego,  and 
makes  every  effort  to  strengthen  it  by  justify- 
ing its  desires  to  itself. 

That  thousands  of  cures  are  made  by  the 
mental  method,  which  I  have  faintly  described, 
no  person  who  has  taken  the  pains  to  investi- 
gate the  matter  can  doubt.  The  sweeping 
charges  brought  against  the  method  rest  on  no 
better  foundation  than  ignorance  and  preju- 
dice. Many  people  are  willfully  blind,  believing 
it  to  their  interest  to  learn  no  more  than  they 
now  know.  For  my  part,  I  let  go  all  hold  of 
the  past,  years  ago;  resolved  to  remain  no 
longer  in  the  worn-out  fields  of  thought  that  I 
so  heartily  despised,  no  matter  where  a  fresher 
and  braver  line  of  thought  might  land  me.  I 
was  so  tired  of  the  dead  past,  that  I  knew  I 
had  nothing  to  lose  in  leaving  it,  and  it  was 
with  a  feeling  akin  to  that  of  the  most  reck- 
less voyageur,  that  I  plunged  into  The  New. 

And  who  can  tell  of  the  reward  that  has  met 
me  every  day  ? 


THE    BLOSSOM    OF    THE    CENTURY  161 

Each  day  the  light  shines  a  little  brighter  on 
this  wonderful  journey  through  the  realm  of 
The  New. 

Old  beliefs  are  fading  fast.  The  vitalizing 
power  of  the  new  and  positive  truth  is  literally 
making  me  over.  Each  opening  day  is  met 
by  a  brighter  recognition  of  all  the  joy  it  holds 
for  those  who  are  looking  for  joy,  and  who  are 
expecting  the  good,  and  not  the  evil ;  until  lit- 
tle by  little,  and  by  slow  degrees,  all  power  to 
recognize  the  evil  is  fading  from  my  intellect ; 
and  only  the  power  to  perceive  the  good  is  re- 
maining. 

Do  you  know  what  this  means? 

It  means  that  heaven  really  exists ;  that  it 
lies  all  about  our  daily  pathway ;  and  that — at 
last — through  the  unveiling  of  our  mental 
perceptions,  we  are  growing  into  a  recognition 
of  it.  There  is  now  a  more  subtile  suggestion 
of  beauty  to  me  in  the  tiny  seed-pod,  than 
there  once  was  in  the  splendid  promise  of  a 
gorgeous  dawn,  clothed  in  its  translucent  gar- 
ments of  pink  and  amethyst  and  blue;  all 
trimmed  with  gold-embroidered  fleece  of  downy 


162  THE    BLOSSOM    OF   THE    CENTURY. 

white.  And  there  is  more  happiness  in  the  un- 
expected flower  by  the  roadside,  than  the  rich- 
est pageant  could  once  yield  me. 

Heaven  is  here,  but  it  only  unfolds  itself  to 
those  who  unfold  to  meet  it. 

I  laugh  at  the  idea  of  going  to  a  heaven  more 
beautiful  than  this  world,  before  we  have  learn- 
ed to  see  the  beauty  that  meets  us  here  at  every 
step. 

What  could  we  do  with  more  beauty,  when 
we  are  blind  to  that  which  we  have? 

Before  closing  I  will  answer  an  objection  that 
is  often  brought  against  the  mental  method  of 
healing.  There  is  an  idea  quite  prevalent  that 
any  mental  application  of  power  must  be  purely 
mesmeric  or  hypnotic. 

Just  what  the  relation  of  hypnotism  to  men- 
tal healing  is,  I  do  not  know ;  but  I  know  this : 
that  while  the  operator  in  hypnotism  gains  con- 
trol of  his  patient  by  the  subjugation  of  the 
patient's  will  to  his  own  will,  that  the  mental 
healer  does  nothing  of  the  kind. 

Indeed,  what  the  mental  healer  does  is  just 
the  opposite.     He  knows  that  the  entire   result 


THE   BLOSSOM   OF   THE   CENTURY.  163 

of  his  efforts  in  healing  depends  on  his  power 
to  strengthen  his  patient's  will. 

The  mental  healer  has  learned  the  inestima- 
ble value  of  individual  will,  and  has  cultivated 
his  own.  will  by  a  calm  and  logical  perception 
of  its  power  and  its  value.  He  sees  that  it  is 
the  bulwark  of  his  own  character,  without 
which,  he  would  take  his  position  among  the 
negative  forces  in  life,  whose  only  use  is  to  be 
expended  in  the  service  of  others. 

He  sees  that  his  will  is  his  only  salvation  in 
a  world  whose  law  of  growth  is  the  survival  of 
the,  fittest,  and  it  assumes  such  proportions  in 
his  estimation,  that  he  looks  on  it  as  the  most 
important  factor  in  his  make-up.  It  has  kept 
him  in  the  ascendt  ncy  on  the  brute  plane,  and 
it  is  pledged  to  hold  him  on  a  level  with  the 
most  progressive  on  the  intellectual  plane. 

Realizing,  then,  that  the  will  is  the  man,  he 
immediately  perceives  that  the  trouble  with 
the  patient  is  his  failure  to  recognize  his  own 
will.  Therefore,  instead  of  trying  to  weaken 
still  farther  the  patient's  will  by  subjugating  it 
to  his  own  will,  he  begins  to  strengthen   the 


164  THE    BLOSSOM   OF  THE    CENTURY. 

will  of  the  patient  by  the  mental  argument  he 
understands  so  well. 

Surely  there  is  a  power  heretofore  unrecog- 
nized in  the  mind  of  man  ;  a  power  that  prom- 
ises so  much,  that  to  neglect  its  investigation 
would  be  an  infinitely  greater  piece  of  folly 
than  to  turn  indifferently  from  a  collection  of 
treasures  richer  than  any  one  has  ever  heaped 
up  before. 

To  investigate  this  mighty  subject  is  all  I  ask 
of  the  reader. 

Health  and  strength  and  beauty  and  opu- 
lence are  in  it  in  greater  fullness  than  can^be 
found  in  the  whole  world  of  thought  outside 
of  it. 

This  much  I  know. 


THE  HOME  COURSE  IN  MENTAL  SCIENCE. 

The  most  essential  thing  I  know  of  for  the 
uplifting  of  humanity,  and  for  healing  all  its  dis- 
tresses of  sickness,  weakness,  deformity  and  pov- 
erty, is  a  knowledge  of  the  science  of  mind;  a 
knowledge  of  what  mind  is  and  what  it  can  do. 

I  am  now  offering  for  home  study  a  complete 
course  of  lessons  upon  this  most  essential  subject. 
There  are  twenty  of  these  lessons  in  twenty  pam- 
phlets.    The  names  of  the  lessons  are  as  follows  : 

1.  Omnipresent  Life.  13.  Mental    Science    a    Race 

2.  Thought, the  Body-builder.  Movement. 

3.  Our  Beliefs.  14.  Mental  Science  Incarnate 

4.  Denials.  in  Flesh  and  Blood. 

5.  Affirmations.  15.  Personality    and    Individ- 

6.  The  Soul  of  Things.  uality. 

7.  Faith,  Our  Guide  through  16.  "  The     Stone     that      the 

the  Dark.  Builders  Rejected." 

8.  Spirit  and  Body  Are  One.  17.  ^  Noble  Egoism  the  Foun- 

9.  Prayer  and  Self -Culture.  Nation  of  Just  Action, 

^^'  '^  Thronr^'    ^^^'""^   *^'  1^-  Recognition   of    the   Will 

11.  The  'pTwer    Above    the  *^^  ^"'"^  «^  ^^^^'^^^^ 

Throne.  1^-  Practical  Healing. 

12.  The  King  on  His  Throne.  20.  Posture  of  the  Will  Man. 

The  price  of  these  lessons  has  been  reduced 
from  $25.00  to  S5.00.  Students  have  the  privilege 
of  sending  $1.00  at  a  time  and  getting  four  lessons. 
Spud  for  descriptive  circular  to 

HELEN   WILMANS, 

Sea  Breeze,  Fla. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

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